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The first time I saw this movie I was still in high school and I was interested in watching the old Japanese Godzilla (a guy in a lizard suit used over and over again). Because of that, I didn't have very high expectations for it, but that was before I learned to treat movies as their own stories. Now, as I watch this movie again (at about the first time Godzilla takes the large batch of fish), I find that the movie is a very good attempt at story telling.
However, after watching it with a friend in college, a friend who lived in New York for much of his earlier life, I learned a few things about the movie that makes me think that it's one very well written continuity error.
It seems to me that the writers tried to make New York a very fictional place, either that or perhaps some of them had never even been to the City that Never Sleeps. One example of this would be the layout of the city itself, like when the helicopters are chasing the big guy between the buildings. The city looked more like a maze rather than the grid of buildings that it really is. Perhaps the writers and miniature set designers did this on purpose to give the helicopters a sense of dread should they get lost. New York, after all, is a very big place where anyone can lose their way if they're not careful.
Another part would be when Godzilla jumps into the Hudson river and encounters the two or three nuclear submarines ready to blast it with torpedoes. It depicts the river as being as deep as parts of the Atlantic when in reality, it's actually only about 15 feet deep. Don't get me wrong, it's a cool idea, especially since the Japanese Godzilla always emerged from the depths of the ocean. Perhaps it was to make him feel more at home, or to show his true amphibious nature by swimming through the river like an eel.
Then, there's the final scene where Godzilla's chasing our heroes over the Brooklyn Bridge. I'm not sure whether the big guy actually weighs less than he looks or not, but anything that big would have done more damage to the bridge than just shaking it around a bit. One step on the Brooklyn Bridge by that thing would have torn it apart. I can understand though that it would be the only thing that could tangle it up for the F-18's to shoot it dead, but a more realistic method of entanglement would be for it to run down the river and slam into it like a tennis court net. But then again, just the fact that they maid the river about a league deep would make it hard for it to run along it.
Godzilla's size comes into perspective once again when our heroes find the nest in Madison Square Garden where the big guy's laid his eggs. I know the place is big, but there is no way he could fit perfectly into the basket ball arena without doing anything more than ripping the floor out. The ceiling and roof would have been completely demolished and the halls would have been smashed through.
Keep in mind folks that this is the point of view of someone who's only seen New York through one form of media or the other, so if there's anything anyone wants to add to the list of errors, than just submit them to my account.
In all fairness, I still find this to be a good attempt at story telling. I hold to my rating of 8/10 for writing and production, but only a 2/10 for continuity.
score 8/10
TitusYorick 21 August 2007
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1716396/ |
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29-11-2019 21:12:05
