Godzillagate

Now, before I get going with the actual topic, I feel I must first get rid of something. I may have become some kind of Audiophile. So, although I have little to no clue about Audio - I understand that Atmos is like ... "the shit"! To me it's to Audio what color has been to Video. It might just make a subtle difference at times, ... and if the movie is only good with Atmos ... it's probably not that great of a Movie, right? Maybe. Art is complicated sometimes. I mean, if you have a Jungle scene for instance - and the Jungle is made alive with Atmos on mind, the whole scene would be lost to someone seeing it without it. And there's also only so much that proper mixing can do. I mean, I've seen Dune Part 2 two times. Once with Atmos and once without. And pretty early in the movie there comes the point where the thumper goes off. Now, in Atmos, the thumping of that thumper is THE prominent sound IN THE ROOM. In "normal" Audio however, it's just one of many sounds. And I am a bit surprised just how much ambient sound there was in that scene. Maybe that was the mistake - hard to tell from memory - but by the time I, although I knew it was coming, really registered it, the thumper was like already on screen. And the entire scene where Paul rides the Sandworm - although a totally incredible sequence overall; It sure makes a difference if you feel like you're there. For lack of a better description. Here it is however also more difficult to tell what Atmos adds to the experience; And similarly I don't know how much Godzilla X Kong thrives on Atmos versus without it. I however know that the parts that really took ME in were entirely unrelated to the audio. But I'm willing to suppose that there might be some atmospheric gravity that had me enjoy the ride more than how I would without it. At any rate - to me, Atmos has become the main reason to go and see movies (I want to see) in theatre.


With that out of the way ... I've been a little bit disturbed. Because ... this has been one of the rare occasions where I had seen (parts of) reviews of the movie prior to seeing it; And I almost hadn't gone seeing it because of that. And ... to give this the likeness of these Reviews: Now, if the reviews were at least accurate with their criticism I might say that I see where they're coming from ... but they're not! At least one review I remember, I was specifically told that the movie didn't have cool moves in it. And I was watching the movie like: "The fuck these guys talkin about?". And I thought I might make it a challenge of sorts - to ask you to go watch some reviews and to then go and see the movie. Because ... how else could we resolve this issue?

Does it need resolving? Well, that'd be yours to decide. And in the end, maybe it really just is one more average Godzilla movie. If that were the case, it wouldn't matter to me because ... Godzilla being one of my Childhood heros I'm OK with average Godzilla movies. I mean, arguably most of them are like average at best. And then it depends on whether you enjoy Kaiju or not. I suppose. Whatever. But that's like ... not really the issue here.
The issue is that I think that movie critics spread bad Mojo - people then don't go to see the movie; And by the time they see it they totally forgot why they didn't watch it "back then". And probably they won't care either! But so, this is entirely independent from whether or not the movie is good; In as far as the contemporary reception is practically built on a lie.

And sure - as I was implying; There's a reasnoable degree to which certain things can be shifted. Like, say ... you weren't impressed with the Villain. That could be spun up as a major contention to the movie. Then maybe add the fact that the movie spends a lot of time with the humans going on their little adventure; To say that that's not what you went to see the film for. I might say that this whole reaction is like blown out of proportion. I mean, it's a Godzilla movie where stuff happens and the humans also play a role in it. I mean, this iteration of Godzilla has from the get go leaned into the ecological angle of the material. That species inhabiting this planet have a symbiotic relationship with one another and all that. And I really enjoy that. Or, perhaps 'appreciate' is the better word. It is certainly one of the more logical or natural aspects of the Godzilla "theme" to focus on. Or perhaps THE theme besides comiserating World War 2 again.
And yea, Climate Change wouldn't really fit in so well - except maybe if you had some Monster that did it, but that'd also ... maybe not be the thing a responsible person would like to be going with.
But sure - we can see the uprising of all the Titans as a consequence ot Climate Change. I mean, one only has to say it and the movie would be woke.


Anyhow. At some point I'd also like to bring the Matrix 4 into this. There's a similar issue. And, while digesting all this, I came to believe that you can't really watch "the Matrix" without an open mind. Or, you can, but then the original is possibly your favorite and about two and three you'll probably only say that they're good actually because people eventually understood them and you'd look stupid if you said that they were trash. To maybe overgeneralize a bit. But anyhow, my angle here aligns with the idea of being less judgmental. To have an open mind. TO let something "sit" for a while. To think and ponder as opposed to vomiting out an opinion. But ... I get that some people might be turned off by like ... 1 hour lore dumps. An argument can certainly be made about how that's actually legitimately bad - but so, I think one way of how to do it, is how they did it in Godzilla x Kong.

But so in the spirit of my Elden Ring Arcane Run ... I may have to ease up a little. I mean, the last 6 month have been enlightening when it comes to my own intellectual capacity in comparison to others. I mean, ever so often I'm exposed to the harsh contrast - and having the matter on my mind also had me notice it more. And I realize that while I might get something after doing it once; Others don't have that skill.
Apart from that I think that the tolerance of the mean is relatively large - but here too I also think that a problem that people have is that they don't trust in their ability to understand something. Maybe due to conditioning. As by too much mansplaning perhaps.
And I wonder. I mean, sometimes ... uhm. It's a good explanation for some things I've noticed. That some people have internally just shut down so much that to the outside it's like the uber WHATEVER attitude - because, like ... "what's the point?".

And yea - I don't mind when the movie leaves a few things up to the viewer. I like internally shut down when the movie treats me like I need my food pre-chewed. But someone who'd take a little longer to understand something might appreciate it when a show like ... takes 5 episodes to build a point; While at that point I'm questioning my life's decisions.


So, to try to not spoil anything ... first of all I have to say that I don't think that it was wrong to make this movie. So to get away from terms such as good and bad. If we went by that, most Godzilla movies probably "shouldn't exist" - and I wouldn't be a fan of that! I think I can also say, that ... although my recollection is very poor on this matter ... this is probably the best "Mothra Plot" I've seen brought to the screen. I mean, Mothra is basically the link between mankind and the titans. And her presence usually takes some little thing to change the outcome of a situation. In this movie ... well. The thing is that it doesn't get properly explained in the movie. I was wondering myself. Like, in one scene I was legitimately like "Godzilla ... you asshole! Why?". And it also felt a little bit weird ... because it felt like the movie wasn't consistent in that regard. Though by the end of it, the only thing I felt was wrong about it was that the Finishing Move didn't carry "enough" catharsis - certainly not enough for the potential that had been built up.

So, I'm thinking: If I would tell you why the things that don't seem to make sense do make sense ... in hindsight ... that might be bad. But maybe you want a choice ... so ... here's the thing; Trying not to spoil too much; While outside of that, I also want to make the argument that this movie is an emotional one. Not like ... . The thing is, most of the protagonists in this movie literally can't talk. And those that can talk, well, are for the most part clueless about the situation. And so from them we get like the reasoning behind their actions and their ideas of what's going on - while everything else is happening.

But what really got me - was right in the beginning where Godzilla does the thing to the other thing ... . I mean, I think that would have made for an awesome poster for the movie. It warped me into my Childhood in the best possible way ... so, yea. From me ... that's totally my type of movie.


Anyhow ... as for Godzillagate ... I haven't watched a LOT of reviews. But then, being back home, I watched a video ...


Where I leave you with this (timestamp (11:24)) Quote of a book I didn't read.