If you are of a certain age, your first encounter with the iconic Japanese kaiju, Godzilla, likely came via late night television sometime in the 1960's, when your best friend stayed over and the two of you cowered behind throw pillows as a fierce, mountain-size behemoth ate up Tokyo on the TV screen. You'd have seen the reworked Americanized version that inserted Raymond Burr into the action because, in those days, TV networks didn't traffic in subtitles, or foreign movies bereft of recognizable American actors. And while the enraged roars of the rampaging Godzilla echoed throughout the house, your parents would have provided background noise arguing over Scrabble at the dining room table.

Okay, so that's my story--or at least some vague approximation of my story--and I'm sticking to it. The 1954 black-and-white movie hit, Godzilla (titled Gojira in Japan) had a huge impact on me as a kid,  and helped cement my lifelong interest in giant movie monsters, and all things dinosaur-related. Having said that, I've been mostly unimpressed by Hollywood's recent takeover of the Godzilla franchise, although, to be honest, Toho's efforts had become a very mixed bag as far back as 1967, when Son of Godzilla infantilized the series. 

However, once I read that Godzilla Minus One was heading to American theaters, I was-- perhaps--far more excited about it than what becomes a man of my years. The pre-opening reviews of the movie were almost uniformly excellent, which would normally give me pause considering that my tastes and the tastes of professional film critics often run on highly divergent tracks. Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, anyone? But, let's not get started on that head-scratcher, we're talking about the return of Godzilla here. 

On opening day of Godzilla Minus One, we attended the first performance in an uncrowded theater with a handful of other golden girls and boys of a certain age who probably thrilled to the original Godzilla film at about the same time I did. I was disappointed that there weren't more fans in attendance that day, but, then, it was Friday afternoon at 1:00, so most of the (presumed) target audience would almost certainly have been working or in school. Or retired, like us, and simply unable to pry themselves away from the golf course or the beach. Hopefully, business picked up with subsequent performances because Godzilla Minus One deserves to be seen by a wide audience. 

This latest film harkens back to the birth of the film franchise. Set in the immediate aftermath of World War II, Godzilla Minus One reinforces the dire anti-war message presented in the original film by having an already-devastated Tokyo threatened once again by the emergence of a seemingly indestructible beast. Godzilla, a sort of Spielbergian dinosaur in the murderous opening sequence, mutates once the tests at Bikini Atoll get underway. He gets much, much bigger--skyscraper-size, in fact--and those rows of spiky fins along his back become charged with nuclear energy that enable the monster to belch fire and blow hurricane force winds. Woe to any military vessels that sail into his path. 

Naturally, Godzilla's first instinct is to head to Tokyo, where many war survivors are living in hastily-constructed shantytowns near the bay. Former kamikaze pilot Koichi (Ryunosuke Kamiki), branded a traitor for refusing to give his life to an already-lost cause, forages for food and attempts to salvage what little he can of his former life. Koichi also knows a little bit about Godzilla, having been traumatized by a run-in with the pre-mutated version at the beginning of the movie. Koichi meets Noriko (Minami Hamabe), a displaced young woman caring for an orphaned baby. The three of them create a makeshift family and, just when things start looking up, Godzilla washes up to wreak havoc on the city. Noriko, working in the Ginza District, runs afoul of the rampaging beast when he waylays her outbound train. 

A teary, vengeful Koichi teams up with other brave and brainy co-workers and volunteers (Yuki Yamada, Munetaka Aoki, Hidetaka Yokiosha, Sakura Ando) to devise a plan that will ultimately destroy Godzilla, whose regenerative capacity has rendered him unstoppable. The downside of this new plan is that it may require Koichi to rely on his kamikaze training and sacrifice his own life, a possibility that no longer daunts the young pilot. 

In action, sci-fi and creature-features, the (sometimes-sketchy) AI-generated special effects can easily overwhelm performances and plots, especially if they're not that distinct in the first place. Not so in Godzilla Minus One, where the actors hold equal footing with the amazing special effects. In fact, the film gives careful attention to each character, building up suspense by emphasizing the unique and poignant personalities of individual cast members: all the performances here are uniformly excellent. Director Takashi Yamazaki does a fine job capturing the spirit of the original film while maintaining a nice balance between action-packed mayhem and a character-driven plot. This isn't to say that Godzilla doesn't look fantastic. The technical crew has created the most violent, terrifying version of the monster yet. 

There have been some complaints that we don't see enough of Godzilla in this movie. I suppose I could see their point if the human drama weren't so compelling. If you go to Godzilla Minus One expecting to see the beast in every scene--and many fans will--you will be disappointed. However, if you are open to seeing a well-rounded allegory of the horrors of war wrapped up in monster movie trappings, you will be handsomely rewarded.