The Kaiju Thread (Giant monsters attack!) - Page 2

I would have no problem with a CGI Godzilla as long as the design still kept the man-in-suit look. You'd have the classic Godzilla look but could add new levels of speed and agility to the character without the limitations of a hundred pound suit.

I agree somewhat. I definitely woud not want them to go all out ala the American Godzilla (shudder) but it would be cool to pick his tail up and tilt him parallel to the ground like the T.rex he was modeled after. Other than that, I'd want his look to be the same.

Except that the suit and miniatures are core elements of the franchise. I don't know how Japanese fans would react to their replacements with CG.

Which is why I think they should keep the overall design if they do decide go CGI. It would be an acknowledgment of where Godzilla's appeal comes from.

They've been using CGI in Godzilla films since "Godzilla 2000". I don't think we need an all-CGI Godzilla. I am not against the use of CGI but I think it needs to be balanced with traditional special effects. The last handful of Godzilla films really weren't my cup of tea. Way too much flash. They give all these monsters such elaborate looks. "Final Wars", in particular, was a real dissapointment to me.

The fact that they keep making the new monsters more and more elaborate is exactly why they should drop the rubber suits. Godzilla in particular has become so inflexible and stiff that the suit actor can't inject any personality into him at all. With a CG version, they could go all-out on the design without sacrificing mobility or character.

Well, maybe they could lose the rubber. Gotta have those miniatures though.

I wish that there could be a Godzilla/Gamera film. I forget the company which made Gamera, but a team up of Godzilla/Gamera would be cool. Also keep the Man In Suits for Toho's Godzilla.

If biolante is the one were he fights the giant plant, then you REALLY need to see it. One of the best Pre-GMK era flicks.

I hope King Caesar curb stomps you.

If they must drop the suits (perish the thought) to accomodate more mobility and more complex expression, then I'd propose using puppetry and animatronics (ala Stan Winston or Jim Henson's creations) with CGI as only necessary.

Kaiju (cinema) just ain't Kaiju without the rubber, IMO.

By the way, I found a great Tokyo toy store with pretty much every Bandai Godzilla doll there is. It's called Yamashiroya (either that, or Yamashiroya is Japanese for "receipt"), and it's near the Ueno station, across the street from the exit with the Starbuck's.

If you're ever in that part of the world, it's worth checking out. My older boy is going to be one happy kid when I get back.

That's the one. I've always thought it looks awesome, but it's never been released on DVD as far as I know.

I can't agree with that. People tend to forget that the Godzilla movies didn't start out as campy kiddie films, and that the suit and puppet work was pretty elaborate and cutting edge stuff in the fifties. What was once forward-thinking effects work has become empty tradition, and it's exactly that inability to let go of the series' traditions that's holding it back and maintaining it as nothing but fodder for children and die-hard fans. Personally, I'd like to see them try to make a real movie again, and there's little chance of that as long as they're sticking to out-of-date effects techniques.

I don't know. Claymation is "out-of-date", but I hope Aardman doesn't give it up.

King Caesar couldn't curb stomp his own sister. Way to pick the only monster gayer than Mothra (no monster with ears that floppy can be trusted around the locker room)

But I digress...

Like has been said by others, CGI has been snuck into Kaiju flix for years. Now I am not one of those 'CGI-can-fix-anything' kind of guys. But I do thing a little thinking outside the suit type thinking is due for Gojira. We have yet to see a real full-on CGI Kaiju brawl and I for one would be interested in seeing that.

CGI is not going to break anything but tradition, and tradition is good for nothing but stifling imagination.

Agreed. I'd like to see them use modern effects technology to finally realize on-screen what this poster promised...



Oh, wait... sorry, I forgot.

Personally, I don't understand why they wouldn't. Claymation is a time-intensive, painstaking and iffy process. And as Flushed Away demonstrated, going with CGI doesn't mean that you have to give up the house style, or sacrifice artistry and personality.

As with any effect technique, it's all about the people behind it. One technique isn't "good" and another "bad". Bad effects artists are going to create bad effects no matter which technique they're using. If you're allowing yourself to believe that using a suit instead of CGI is necessarily going to result in a better Godzilla movie, then you're mired in tradition, and letting nostalgia determine your preferences.

Besides, if any of that were true, The Corpse Bride would be a better movie than The Incredibles. And it's not.

All artists have a preferred technique, though. Unless you are looking at it from a a business perspective. I seem to remember Burton wanting to do the martians as stop-motion animation in Mars Attacks, but was later talked into CGI due to time and budgetary reasons. If I also remember right, Burton instructed the animators to give the creatures a stop-motion look to their movements.

Art is a labor of love as much as a business prospect, so an artist should be allowed to use the techniques they truly love within that art. So, while the technique may be outdated, if the person making the film wants to honor that tradition they should. Doesn't mean that someone else shouldn't be allowed to take a property, such as Godzilla, and use different effects techniques to realize their own vision. There's room for both.

I'm sure Phill Tippett would love to break out some old school stop-motion models if the opportunity arose even though he evolved along with the industry.

I freakin' love that one! What other Kaiju film has people actually being devoured ?

They keep finding chewed clothing spat all over the place....that gave some real dread to the proceedings for a little kid viewer like me.

KING KONG LIVES had some spectacular people munching as well, IIRC.

It would make more sense to compare Flushed Away with Wallace & Gromit. Both are good, but it's just not quite the same.

Obviously to the modern adult eye the special effects in Godzilla films are a bit hokey. The CG elements could use a lot of improvement. I just hope they don't replace the miniatures completely.

I still feel that unless you have Weta or ILM in your corner, the CGI creation isn't going to achieve the reality of Stan Winston's animatronic T-Rex or Jim Henson's Skeksis or Rick Baker's werewolf transformation or any other terrific latex creation from this thread. Even practical effects that are adequate are more believable than adequate CGI (hence why they still use plenty of models/miniatures in good FX movies).

It might may be the traditionalist in me speaking, but I'd gladly watch bad/cheesy rubber suit over bad/cheesy CGI any day of the week and twice on Sunday (if the budget is the same). But, if you have the budget to knock my socks off with your CGI creature (Davy Jones), then fine. I can surely go for that. But if it's going to look like a PSX game (Attack of the Gryphon or pick any Sci Fi Original flick), I'd rather have a lumbering paper machete puppet (At the Earth's Core).

I'm anxious to see how the CGI-heavy D-War holds up. Looks a billion times better than the bad-CGI Reptilian.

Look at some of the recent stuff that Henson has been doing. Not for the story per se, but for the creatures: Mee Shee and 5 Children & It have amazing blendings of animatronic and CGI, depending on the needs of a shot. Whatever the best technique is to sell it to the audience is used for maximum effect.

Generally kaiju don't really behave in ways that you'd expect a heavy reliance on CGI (except for breath-weapons, etc), but looks like that might change with D-War.

There's something magical (and probably costly) in seeing that miniature city erupt in an explosion of splinters, sparks, and debris. I love it.

I should back up a bit here and state that I'm actually a proponent of mixed effects work wherever possible. What made the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park work so well was that they knew how to cut between different types of effects. The proper editing between full-body CGI, puppeted heads and animatronics can create a level of reality that no single effect can achieve. It's all about having a director who knows his way around the techniques, and knows what will work best for each shot. That's why Spielberg is still the king, and Simon West is a putz.

I subscribe to that as well, whole-heartedly.

And there was peace again in the Kaiju thread...

I would think there'd have to be some way at this point to design and build a light-weight Godzilla costume that retained the look but allowed for more freedom of movement and didn't threaten to suffocate whoever is inside it.

I recently watched Godzilla Raids Again (the second movie). It contains a close-up of Godzilla roaring that was clearly a hand puppet, but worked really well. I finally realized that it was because the head moved forward as the mouth opened, creating a very natural-looking movement for a roaring creature. When they dropped puppets and went exclusively to body suits, the head was locked in place, and they were stuck with just having the jaw open. By dropping the simpler effect, they robbed Godzilla of a little bit of character.

And that is why they should mix effects.

However they brought him to life, I thought Godzilla looked pretty good in Final Wars.

So I'd like to ask why there's never been a good kaiju video game. Or has there, and I just missed it?

There was Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee, which was pretty fun.

I loved that game. Best Godzilla game ever made, and it was made by an American team. Irony.

Yes, Final Wars was a nice throwback to the 90's design. The 2000 redesign was too stiff and hunched over to allow the suit actor any kind of physical performance. Final Wars went back to a more mobile design.

Did any of the Godzilla films go 3D during the mid-80s craze?

Bump.

I want more details/news on the Parker & Stone Giant Monsters Attack Japan! flick, dammit. I hope and pray the Chiodo Bros. (Team America) are involved.

If not, maybe the guys responsible for the Hummer: Monsters campaign.

This calls for a BUMP.

I have that VHS.

I got a whole shelf on my super-duper DVD shelves just for my daikaiju VHS/DVD flicks. I "retire" a VHS from the shelf once I get it on DVD, but I don't throw them out. Those things are like priceless rubies to me.

Also, I said this once on another thread, but Godzilla's Revenge and Terror of Mechagodzilla from the new swanky ClassicMedia releases being only available in the box set is fuckin'. Bull. Shit.

I BOUGHT all the individual releases! What a gyp!

They also promised a Rodan release... lyin' fuckers...

I'm incapable of liking anything to do with Humvees. It's a character flaw, but it's a very small one.

Between the Parker/Stone project and Dreamworks' Monsters vs Aliens, it's a little sad that the great hope for new kaiju cinema lies in two movies basically lampooning them. I want some straight kaiju action, dammit.

Well, y'know Cloverfield.

That's the past. I'm lookin' to the future, man.

I am really hoping for a Cloverfield sequel that ditches the whole camcorder gimmick, though.

I've always dug Godzilla, but not to a high degree. I do know one thing, that Godzilla vs. Megalon cover is tops. I need to get reacquainted with good ol' Gojira.

Well there is the the Takashi Miike remake of Daimajin, although I heard that it might have been canceled. Heres me crossing my fingers that it gets finished.

Amen to that but finally getting to see the uncut version of "Terror" was nearly worth it. Though the added prologue is lame and greatly overrated.

Surprised no one else on this thread has mentioned Kaiju Big Battel. Think WWF in monster suits.

Amazon.com says that they'll be released individually on April 29. Hrm. We'll see... WE'LL SEE...

That reminds me, I should check eBay for that "MST3K Godzilla" volume that got scrapped.

*cough*

If people want to play a great Kaiju videogame...SNK's Arcade Classics Vol 1 arrives on the PS2 on April 29th. While King Of Monsters is not an official Godzilla game, there are lookalikes of Godzilla, King King and others.

Shit , King of Monsters was tits. There was the King Kong, Godzilla, and Ultraman clones along with Hedorah and Megalon-alikes. I wasted a lot of quarters on this beast, too bad the original ports neutered the lineup.

Urf. Edit to read 'I'm surprised I thought I was being original at three in the morning'.

And the greatest Kaiju videogame is still Rampage.

Okay, let's say I knew a guy who's closest Kaiju experience was seeing the American Godzilla.. he had never seen a Japanese, giant Tokyo crusher movie in it's entirety before.

What are the top 3-5 you would recommend to me-Uh.. to that person. Yeah, that loser person, who I openly mock with my Godzilla knowledge. Haha.. you.. haha.

Gamera, Guardian of the Universe (1995) is really the only movie that gets things 100% right.

The original Gojira is essential for context.

Infra-Man is, well... Infra-Man.