Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995)

[DaikaijuSokogeki!]

This is one I haven't seen in a while, but I'll try to see how much I can remember. The film starts out strong with Godzilla's sudden attack on Hong Kong while Ifukube's score thunders in the background, all culminating in the best title card EVER. Then once we get introduced to our lead cast and situation, the film slows down. The atmosphere leading up to Destoroyah's first appearance is pretty chilling, leading up to a scene that's typical Kazuki Omori Hollywood rip-off magic (although I will admit, Destoroyah's first attack did scare me senseless as a kid, but that's because I hadn't seen Aliens yet).

The costumes look great, that's for sure. I especially love the work put in Godzilla Jr.'s suit and how he's becoming more like Godzilla but still has the tiny dorsal fins and things like that. Ifukube's score is extremely powerful, even though it recycles many of his older work. The plot works for a while, then it just sort of simmers out. The characters are completely uninteresting, seeing as how I remember none of their names. In fact, I was always bothered by how Emiko Yamane, in one of the coolest cameos in the Godzilla franchise, shows up for two scenes and then is never mentioned again. The SPFX are a mixed bag. While Godzilla's glowing suit effect looks awesome and his meltdown incorporates several unique effects such as stop motion and CGI, the rest is just meh. The flying models are stiff, the matte work is lazy, and the clear use of Bandai toys in a few scenes is just inexcusable. The film's FX aren't nearly as hit and miss as Spacegodzilla, but its got its large share of faults.

The film does succeed entirely in the dramatic effect of Godzilla's death, though. The advertising may have mercilessly whored out that plot point, it still hurts once it actually unfolds. It's Godzilla's saddest death in the series bar none, accompanied by what I believe is an original and powerful piece from Ifukube. That scene alone is worth the 100+ minutes of averageness.

[HedorahLives]

A depressing film to watch since Godzilla is clearly dying from the very beginning, but probably one of the most captivating kaiju films yet done. All the good points have pretty much already been noted, so I'll just point out the part that bugged me most. That would be the SWAT team against the human-sized Destroyahs. Personally, I thought the Destroyah story had been pretty eerie up to that point and I wish they had gone a route more similar to the original Rodan with the miners vs. the giant bugs. You know, a more straightforward horror approach. Normally I don't mind Omori's hollywood bastardizations (I appreciate the camp value of M-11), but here the obvious Aliens rethread kinda cheapens the film, especially since the Destroyah vs. Swat team sequence is way too sanitized compared to its source material.

That's my only real complaint though. Top notch kaiju film otherwise. Godzilla's last stand is one for the ages.

[Legion1979]

Hell froze over as, for the first time in God knows how long, I decided to watch bits and pieces of this one. Like all Heisei films I don't have the patience to watch this all the way through.

As this was the first time watching this film on a 52" HDTV (which I've had for almost two years, so it has been a while since I've watched it) little things which never bothered me before stood out like a sore thumb. The godawful mattes at the beginning, for one. A glowing red Godzilla is decimating Hong Kong and people stroll down the street like nothing is wrong. That's just piss poor.

Oh, and if these aren't Bandai toys, they're awfully close...


Still, I love that Godzilla suit, the aggregate Destroyah is an impressive creation and most of Ifukube's score (save the aggravating Destroyah theme) is terrific. His opening rampage music, with it's deep bass, is probably one of my top favorite Ifukube pieces from this era. I have a deep nostalgic attachment for this movie and I'll always love it for what it is...

,,,but anyone saying it's one of the best in the series is seriously kidding themselves. So many things I gave a free pass to 15 years ago when I was young and stupid aggravate the hell out of me now. A good but very flawed movie.

[Arrow]

I'll just post what I said over at Monster Zero:

I always found Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, like a lot of the Heisei movies, to be a bit of a 'hit-and-miss'. On the one hand I couldn't think of a better way to have closed the Heisei series - Godzilla vs. the Oxygen Destroyer. It really brings the entire series full circle and closes with one of my all-time favorite scenes in any Godzilla movie. Godzilla's meltdown is the thing most memorable about the movie and it is done so unbelievably well. Godzilla, alone and dying, while Akira Ifukube's theme "Requiem" plays in the background. Godzilla's final roar and the wonderful CGI effect as he finally dies really gives the movie an emotional feeling. What helps is that this Godzilla, the Heisei Godzilla, is the same version of the character that had been in all seven movies. The climax that surrounded the scene: Godzilla Junior's death and Godzilla's last stand against Destoroyah, was done excellently. The monster drama is well-done here. You really feel for Godzilla as a character.

Unfortunately, the rest of the movie is not quite as up to par. As usual, Kawakita's awesome effects are countered by some really mediocre ones. Godzilla's rampage in Hong Kong is ruined by horrible matted shots of people walking calmly in the picture as Godzilla rampages around them. Destoroyah is your standard late-Heisei era beam spammer, needlessly bulky and nearly immobile. His design is awe-inspiring, but his execution is terrible. The flying Destoroyah prop moves awkwardly in the air. And the Aggregates are so obviously ripped off from the Xenomorph aliens. On the plus side, the Burning Godzilla is fantastic. And Godzilla Junior is a great design as well. The Super X-III is my least favorite of all the flying mechs, but that's just personal preference. Its freeze cannon is a neat effect, however, and I like the CGI freezing of Godzilla.

For what was supposed to be a final film, I was disappointed that the human characters do little but shoot at the monsters and stand around on the sidelines. Miki was never high on my list of favorite human characters in the Godzilla series, but I find her almost as annoying as the previous film - Godzilla vs. Space Godzilla. Once again her character exists only to be inconsistent. On the one hand she doesn't want to harm Godzilla or Junior, but assists in aiding G-Force anyway, same as the two films previously. None of the other main human characters do much but stand around and explain the events of the film. They are as bland as ever here.

Akira Ifukube's scores are marvelous. I cannot pick out a theme that I didn't like. My favorite was Requiem, but I love Destoroyah's ominous, threatening theme. I also love Junior's sad, haunting theme as well. Even the song playing over the montage at the end of the movie is nice.

All in all, despite its flaws, I enjoy this movie. It's the kind of film that can only be done once and for that, I appreciate it.

[spinzilla]

Excusing some goofy special effects here and there, I like the film a lot. Destroyah, in my opinion, is probably Toho's best kaiju design since Biollante and hasn't been surpassed yet.

[HedorahLives]

Excusing some goofy special effects here and there, I like the film a lot. Destroyah, in my opinion, is probably Toho's best kaiju design since Biollante and hasn't been surpassed yet.

Agreed. Conceptually, Destroyah is pretty similar to Hedorah (he starts off as many small Destroyahs, merges into a big one, has a flying form, and finally ends up a huge Destroyah that nearly dwarfs Godzilla. Where's Banno's royalty check?), but his design is pretty fantastic. I liked all his crab features and his face was creepy. Some fans have likened it to the grinning skull of the grim reaper and that's not too far off. Plus, he was written exactly as he should've been. What a bastard.

[starscream82]

i never liked destroyah. i always thought that if godzilla were to die it would be a result of mecha-g or ghidorah. i think a villian with a little more history would have made for a stronger story. plus destroyah looks like a mutated baragon.

[KiryuFreak]

I liked the movie. The story was great, the burning idea and costume was amazing.

[Hedorah]

i never liked destroyah. i always thought that if godzilla were to die it would be a result of mecha-g or ghidorah. i think a villian with a little more history would have made for a stronger story. plus destroyah looks like a mutated baragon.

Destroyah was a perfect choice in my opinion, Godzilla was made by the H-Bomb, they use Serizawa's Oxygen Destroyer to kill it. That same Oxygen Destroyer created what would become Destroyah, so it was basically both of mankinds mistakes. They battled and Destroyah had the advantage, but he was killed by the military, Godzilla melted down, both threats were thought to be gone, but Junior had been revived.

[Dash 7]

This is my third favorite Heisei G-film next to RoG and Biollante. You can see my review on the main site.

[Mini-Godzilla]

Maybe my favorite sequel to Return of Godzilla (Biollante being the other obvious candidate). There are some much-appreciated nods to the 1954 original (Emiko Yamane! Oxygen Destroyer!), and the new characters are interesting enough. Mikki almost seems to be included as an afterthought, and the psychic subplot is mostly played down this round. The opposing monster is merely okay, and Glowzilla is better in concept than execution. Also, I can't help but nitpick the decision to have G-Junior around in these last few movies, as it takes away a lot of the impact of Godzilla finally croaking. Even so, it recaptures the feel of the 80's films, and thus makes for a decent bookend to this continuity.

[Ookondru99]

Alright so I have this friend that i've recently introduced to godzilla. I have a large collection of movies, 22 i think, and we recently got a rental house along with him and my other friend. So we start talking about my collection and I show him my favorite Godzilla movie, Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster (great starting point, right?). He gets really interested in Godzilla and the monsters he fights. My other friend enjoys the movies, except one, Godzilla vs. Destroyah. He doesn't like it because Godzilla didn't beat Destroyah and Godzilla dies. I personally like Destroyah, so I decide to show my friend the movie and let him decide. Then through the film we notice the humans love to use monsters as pawns. 1) they use Jr as bait to lure godzilla to fight Destroyah, and the didn't expect jr to survive. 2) they Tried to get destroyah to kill Godzilla. 3) once godzilla is melting down they decide destroyah has filled his purpose and kill him. Wtf is up with that?

[Living Corpse]

They decided to kill Destoryah because they learned just what it is exactly and what it is is a super monster like Burning Godzilla that can and will destroy the world utterly if left unchecked so they instead killed him and then turned their freeze weapons on Godzilla and hoped it would work. Basically they used Destoryah at first cause they thought he could kill Godzilla before meltdown, think he was a miracle in disguise that can stop the apocalypse but once they learned that they were really dealing with two apocalypse's they choose to kill the one that would make the world die slowly with a whimper (Destoryah) and hoped for the best when trying to zreeze the one that would burn it with a bang (Burning Godzilla).

That and they made freeze weapons at the last minute and figured, you know these two have severely weakened each other, now might be I one golden chance to kill two planet killers with one stone.

[Ookondru99]

Still think its skreeonk up. Use desxtroyah to kill godzilla and when he doesn't lets shoot him in the back. DAMN YOU HUMANS! lol

[Living Corpse]

Still think its skreeonk up. Use desxtroyah to kill godzilla and when he doesn't lets shoot him in the back. DAMN YOU HUMANS! lol

And he'd shoot us in the back if we had aimed for Goji first. That thing was on no ones side and had to be stopped even if it meant using him and another one of our enemies, Goji, against each other.

But yeah we are pretty skreeonk up. Monsters really have no clue that humans are the worst monsters, using everything and everyone as a pawn against each other just to save our own sorry asses from our mistakes.

[Ookondru99]

^^ this post just got deep

[therealmccoy]

You rented a house just so you and your buddies could watch Godzilla movies?

I really didn't see anything wrong with that part of the story, besides the fact that it moved a little quick. They changed their mind from "Godzilla's bad, and we should use Destoroyah to kill it", to "Godzilla's good; we should use him to kill Destoroyah, before he melts down and destroys the world!" in a matter of several minutes. I don't know how it could have been done any better though.

[Living Corpse]

Lesser of two evils. Godzilla can destroy the world. Destroyah WANTS to destroy the world.

[Tohosaurus]

The monsters are a menace to our civilization, so while it's not done with kindness in mind, they're looking out for the citizens when they attempt to do away with the monsters. They're doing the right thing admittedly and it's what would happen in the real world (trying to get rid of the monsters by any means, cruel or otherwise).

[Inferno Rodan]

1) they use Jr as bait to lure godzilla to fight Destroyah, and the didn't expect jr to survive. 2) they Tried to get destroyah to kill Godzilla. 3) once godzilla is melting down they decide destroyah has filled his purpose and kill him. Wtf is up with that?

1 and 2 are just variations of the same classic trope of monster movies in general. And besides that they just make sense. Have them fight each other, one kills the other (or, ideally, they BOTH die), and then you finish off the weakened winner. As for 3, they didn't kill Destoroyah because he "filled his purpose." They killed Destoroyah because he was trying to escape. He was severely wounded and attempting to flee. Why on earth would they not kill him then when they had the opportunity?