Godzilla 1954 Remake

[Tyrant_Lizard_King]

I'd totally be up for a big budget Hollywood remake, especially in the hands of somebody like Frank Darabont. Of course things would have to change if you're looking for a modern update, especially if you decide to cast American actors in an American setting, but think it could be done and done very well. But we'd need someone who'd take it seriously and give it proper emotional resonance.

[LegendZilla]

I'd totally be up for a big budget Hollywood remake, especially in the hands of somebody like Frank Darabont. Of course things would have to change if you're looking for a modern update, especially if you decide to cast American actors in an American setting, but think it could be done and done very well. But we'd need someone who'd take it seriously and give it proper emotional resonance.

I am talking about an authentic Toho-produced remake.

[Zarm]

Really? Disliking two interpretations of the character nine years in the future cause them to stop making movies after Kiryu got diminishing box office and Final Wars tanked?

[UltramanGoji]

Really? Disliking two interpretations of the character nine years in the future cause them to stop making movies after Kiryu got diminishing box office and Final Wars tanked?

Nope. Resistance to change.

Reinventing the character is vital to keeping the franchise profitable. The Millenium series fell into stagnation and audiences got fed up with it (along with being released every nine months or so, it gets a little overwhelming).

[Zarm]

But GMK did the best of the lot, did it not? Doesn't seem like audience resistance to change was a problem at the time. And arguably, it was the major stylistic change and departure from anything familiar in Final Wars that sealed the series' fate. I don't think resistance to change, by studio or by audience, can be identified as a culprit; it went both ways in the Millenium series, finding both acceptance and disfavor.

[MechaGoji Bro7503]

But GMK did the best of the lot, did it not? Doesn't seem like audience resistance to change was a problem at the time. And arguably, it was the major stylistic change and departure from anything familiar in Final Wars that sealed the series' fate. I don't think resistance to change, by studio or by audience, can be identified as a culprit; it went both ways in the Millenium series, finding both acceptance and disfavor.

GMK was a nice change of pace, but it wasn't as significant as say Shin or MP.

What I mean is GMK was still a "standard" Godzilla in a sense in terms of abilities.

[UltramanGoji]

One can also cite the immense budget for GFW as a factor in Toho seizing production. Since GMK, the Millenium series did average around $16 million USD in terms of box office sales and GFW's budget was $19 million and only made back $12 mill.

Shin is one of the most successful in the franchise and features a Godzilla wholly unlike anything we've seen before. And Monster Planet is an animated movie with yet another new interpretation of Godzilla. I don't know anything about MP's success, but this level of new ideas is a good idea overall for the brand, especially in Japan.

Folks don't have to like it, but saying that Toho "has their head up their ass" is an extremely idiotic thing to say.

[BlankAccount]

I pretty much see Shin Godzilla as a remake of Gojira, just set in 2016 instead of 1954 and no Oxygen Destroyer.

[LegendZilla]

Really? Disliking two interpretations of the character nine years in the future cause them to stop making movies after Kiryu got diminishing box office and Final Wars tanked?

Nope. Resistance to change.

Reinventing the character is vital to keeping the franchise profitable. The Millenium series fell into stagnation and audiences got fed up with it (along with being released every nine months or so, it gets a little overwhelming).

Just why is it, when Tristar quote-on-quote reinvents Godzilla in a highly unconventional manner, people by the masses act with scorn, yet a majority are okay when Toho does it?

[eabaker]

Really? Disliking two interpretations of the character nine years in the future cause them to stop making movies after Kiryu got diminishing box office and Final Wars tanked?

Nope. Resistance to change.

Reinventing the character is vital to keeping the franchise profitable. The Millenium series fell into stagnation and audiences got fed up with it (along with being released every nine months or so, it gets a little overwhelming).

Just why is it, when Tristar quote-on-quote reinvents Godzilla, people by the masses act with scorn, yet a majority are okay when Toho does it?

Apples and oranges. One was a bold reinvention that took the character in new directions for specific thematic reasons, the other was a retreat to something more generic and less meaningful than a traditional incarnation of Godzilla.

It's not about who did the reinventing, it's about what they brought to that reinvention.

[SonOfGorgo]

I am talking about an authentic Toho-produced remake.

I think they were planning one back in the late 70s for the 25th anniversary.
https://www.tohokingdom.com/cutting_roo ... dzilla.htm

[LegendZilla]

I pretty much see Shin Godzilla as a remake of Gojira, just set in 2016 instead of 1954 and no Oxygen Destroyer.

In a figurative sense that is.

[Zarm]

I pretty much see Shin Godzilla as a remake of Gojira, just set in 2016 instead of 1954 and no Oxygen Destroyer.

In a figurative sense that is.

Actually, they hit pretty much the exact same story beats, point for point. The characters and details are different, but the plot structure is largely identical.

[LegendZilla]

I pretty much see Shin Godzilla as a remake of Gojira, just set in 2016 instead of 1954 and no Oxygen Destroyer.

In a figurative sense that is.

Actually, they hit pretty much the exact same story beats, point for point. The characters and details are different, but the plot structure is largely identical.

In the same way that The Dark Knight can be considered a remake of the 1989 Batman movie.

[Cybermat47]

Really? Disliking two interpretations of the character nine years in the future cause them to stop making movies after Kiryu got diminishing box office and Final Wars tanked?

Nope. Resistance to change.

Reinventing the character is vital to keeping the franchise profitable. The Millenium series fell into stagnation and audiences got fed up with it (along with being released every nine months or so, it gets a little overwhelming).

Just why is it, when Tristar quote-on-quote reinvents Godzilla in a highly unconventional manner, people by the masses act with scorn, yet a majority are okay when Toho does it?

Tristar’s Godzilla was weak and lesss destructive. They “reinvented” Godzilla by taking things away from him.

Shin Godzilla and MP Godzilla, on the other hand, are still immune to conventional weapons and still have atomic breath. Their origins are different and they have more abilities, but they’re still gods of destruction.

Added in 20 minutes 16 seconds:

In a figurative sense that is.

Actually, they hit pretty much the exact same story beats, point for point. The characters and details are different, but the plot structure is largely identical.

In the same way that The Dark Knight can be considered a remake of the 1989 Batman movie.

Godzilla (1954):

- Unseen, Godzilla wreaks havoc upon Japan’s economy by sinking merchant shipping off the coast of Japan.

- Godzilla emerges and crushes several buildings and kills people.

- Dr. Yamane is out in charge of a team to research the monster.

- Godzilla lands in Shinagawa, destroying a train.

- Godzilla makes a second landing, is sttacked by the JGSDF, and uses its atomic breath to devastate Tokyo.

- Dr. Serizawa, with assistance from the JMSDF, kills Godzilla with the oxygen destroyer.

Shin Godzilla:

- Unseen, Godzilla causes havoc upon Japan’s economy by damaging aqua lines, blocking shipping, and grounding flights from Haneda in Tokyo Bay.

- Godzilla emerges and crushes hundreds of buildings, killing people.

- Godzilla evolves in Shinagawa and destroys a train.

- Rando Yaguchi is put in charge of a team to research the monster and discover how to stop it.

- Godzilla makes a second landing, is sttacked by the JGSDF, and uses his atomic breath to devastate Tokyo.

- Yaguchi’s team, with aid from the JGSDF, USAF, and USN, defeats Godzilla with the coagulant.

Batman (1989):

- Jack Napier, a gangster, is set up by his boss, Grissom, as revenge for his affair with Grissom’s wife.

- In his first encounter with the mysterious Batman, Napier is disfigured and exposed to chemicals, becoming the Joker.

The Dark Knight:

- The Joker, a mysterious criminal psychopath, robs a bank in Gotham, killing all his henchmen in the process.

- The Joker attacks Bruce Wayne’s party and meets Batman, whose origins were extensively detailed in the previous film.

Oh, screw it, this is going to take forever. TDK and BM89 are completely different. TDK has Two-Face, the Rachel/Harvey/Bruce love triangle, the whole thing with the money and Hong Kong etc., Gordon is a much more prominent character, BM89 ends with the city accepting Batman as a hero while TDK has them believing he’s a villain, the Joker in TDK wants to show how twisted and selfish people really are while in BM89 he wants to gas a bunch of them... I could go on all day, but I don’t want to.

[LegendZilla]

^The Force Awakens can also be seen as more-or-less a remake of A New Hope.

[eabaker]

None of the characters in Shin are analogous to characters in the original Godzilla. The fact that the monster appears at the points suggested by basic story structure in both, and that the human cast takes measures to counter him on those occasions, doesn't make it a re-make of the original.

[Zarm]

In a figurative sense that is.

Actually, they hit pretty much the exact same story beats, point for point. The characters and details are different, but the plot structure is largely identical.

In the same way that The Dark Knight can be considered a remake of the 1989 Batman movie.

Not... really. I mean, I'd need to watch it again (or look through pages of Shin reactions for my notes if I put it in there), but from memory, you've got the initial signs tied to a boat, signs of manifestation with an unclear cause, investigation, first appearance, government presentations on assumed origins, emergence and rampage that leaves Tokyo in flames but is halted giving a brief reprieve, discovery of a method to stop him, and final climatic human effort to stop the slumbering, awakening creature before he can resume his attack.

There are differences, certainly; what the human characters are doing is vastly different, the different phases of Godzilla's appearance aren't marked by his vanishing back into the sea (except in one instance), but he remains present during the between-points, the government's reaction is different, etc. it's not a re-hash. But it is taking the same basic plot structure and story points and applying a different world to them. It's putting the same sequence of events and overall narrative framework into a different context and with a different focus. In that, I think it's rather brilliant- it is a remake, following the original beat-for-beat but framed by a completely different set of circumstances which dictate the plot focus and subplots. The same skeleton, essentially, but with a very different skin built around it. It takes the same framework but allows the differing circumstances of its setting to dictate the way the characters, reactions, and details of the narrative develop; almost more like growing a new organism around the same nucleus, if you will.

I would suggest that it very much is a remake in concept, as it hews to the identical structure with a fidelity unseen in 30-odd intervening films- but a 'remake' that takes its underpinning narrative structure and basic plot points and lets the altered circumstances of a modern world form a new story around that framework. Not a rehash, a remake, a reboot, a re-imagining, or anything we particularly have a term for in the film industry. Something new, and organic, derived from something pre-existing and cherished without copying it. In that way, it is quite visionary, as it's a way of remaking that, to my mind, has never really been seen before.


(Arguably, TFA from ANH is the closest analogy in western cinema, but even then, the basic plot structure isn't really the same at all; there's still a macguffin in a droid, a mentor's death, and a superweapon at the end, but the plot structure is really not paralleled inbetween; it's radically different. That touches on archetypal echoes of ANH and uses familiar tropes to craft a new story- Shin actually takes the same narrative structure and writes a new script around it.)

[LegendZilla]

^By remake, you mean it very roughly. As you said, a remake in concept.

[BlankAccount]

None of the characters in Shin are analogous to characters in the original Godzilla. The fact that the monster appears at the points suggested by basic story structure in both, and that the human cast takes measures to counter him on those occasions, doesn't make it a re-make of the original.

Reimagining then. If it did everything 100% same then people would know what to expect. As far as origin stories go Shin feels like a love letter with twists to the original even going so far as having him be the only monster. Not even G2014 took that risk, and it was an origin story. I don't vount 1984 because while it is an origin story, kind of, it's also a sequel and while no rival monster is there the Super-X puts up enough of a fight to be a stand in for one. And G98 is mostly dismissed as a fluster cuck.