Movie Review - Godzilla Vs. Kong 3D

Of course, there's a lot of cinema history here. The titular character originated in King Kong (1933) and this year marks the 88th anniversary of that film. King Kong is one of the greatest movie monsters ever created. That 1933 film is considered an all-time, American classic. The other titular character originated in Godzilla (1954) and this year marks the 67th anniversary of that title. Godzilla has since become one of the longest-running film franchises in history. There have been over 30 entries in the franchise. That 1954 film is considered a Japanese classic. That 1954 film also started the genre, known as kaiju, which is about large monsters attacking large cities. The character of King Kong was first introduced into this genre with King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962).

This film, directed by Adam Wingard, is the first time those two titans have been brought together, pitted against each other or paired with one another in nearly 60 years. It's technically a sequel, being the fourth entry in the specific series that started with the American reboot, Godzilla (2014). It continued with Kong: Skull Island (2017) and Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019). Because Godzilla and King Kong have been around for so long and have been so ingrained in the culture to such a degree, I can say that if you haven't seen either of the three previous, aforementioned films, going back to 2014, you won't be lost. Arguably, there will be certain, human characters with whom you won't be familiar nor about whom you'll care. However, there's about a dozen, human characters and realistically none of them matter, except for one and that one is introduced in this film and wasn't present in any of the previous.

Rebecca Hall (The Town and The Prestige) stars as Ilene Andrews, a woman who works on Skull Island, an island in the Indian Ocean, the home to King Kong, a giant gorilla who is several stories high. She's been studying Kong for years and tries to understand his behavior. She's not the sole, human character about whom we will come to care. That person is Ilene's adopted daughter named Jia, played by Kaylee Hottle. Jia is deaf, and she communicates with Ilene using sign language. Jia also communicates with Kong using sign language as well, and it becomes clear that Kong cares about Jia and has befriended her. It's interesting to see something so big care for something so small.

Alexander Skarsgård (Big Little Lies and True Blood) also stars as Nathan Lind, a professor who believes that Kong, Godzilla and the other large monsters originate from a place called "Hollow Earth," which he believes lies toward the core of the planet. It's a place of power and magic and Nathan is chosen as the person to lead a military fleet to Hollow Earth, so that Kong can be protected and also so that certain people can mine some of the Hollow Earth's power.

Besides being a tall, handsome man who isn't much of a leader and is a bit afraid of Kong, Nathan is a character who isn't much needed. He's just there to follow Kong and look up at him with wonder. There's a similar group of people who follow Godzilla, who is a giant lizard that can spit energy like a laser out of its mouth. It's also amphibious and mostly lives under water. It emerges from the water to attack places like Florida or Hong Kong. The humans following Godzilla are trying to figure out why Godzilla is targeting these specific places, but again none of them matter. One of them at least is a bit entertaining as comic relief.

Brian Tyree Henry (Joker and Widows) co-stars as Bernie Hayes, an employee at a company called Apex Cybernetics. Bernie believes that the CEO of Apex knows why Godzilla has been attacking because each of the places that Godzilla attacks is a site owned by Apex. Bernie starts a podcast, which attempts to investigate a possible conspiracy involving Apex and Godzilla. However, he's just a guy who spouts funny one-liners. He's again just the comic relief in this film and not much more. He keeps the audience laughing and engaged as the film jumps to the next action scene or science-fiction moment.

Really, if you go to see this film, that's what you're going to see it for, the action scenes or the science-fiction moments. Those action scenes involve the titular characters fighting each other. There's no real reason for the two to fight. Someone has a throwaway line that Godzilla and Kong have some ancient beef where their two species have been fighting for decades or centuries, so the two are historical enemies. In a film like this, there doesn't need to be any other reason more in-depth than that. It's an excuse to get them to fight and that's enough. This leads to three major fight scenes between Godzilla and Kong, and they're executed quite well. The first fight is probably the best, which is a fight that the two have on the water, which is a fight that was unexpected and unlikely because you'd never think to see Kong on the water. For that, it made the whole thing really thrilling.

Finally, one thing that is notable is the 3D effects. If one sees this film in a theater, I'd recommend seeing it in 3D. I've never been a fan of 3D but the effects for that format are beautifully done here.

Rated PG-13 for creature violence, destruction and brief language.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 53 mins.

In theaters and HBO Max.