If you go through Godzilla's filmography, you will notice that a majority of his films are named "Godzilla vs _____." While this simplistic style of naming movies reduces the film to a monster-style grudge match, it does make keeping track of the films much easier. Plus, this also means you can plug just about any fool thing into that blank slot and it sounds like a legit Godzilla movie. In keeping with this style of straight-ahead thinking, here's a collection of projects that I think Godzilla could be placed into without any difficulty.
In many ways, this would be a perfect match. An insanely long, thudding plot that wanders off in several unrelated directions before everything grinds to a halt in order for there to be a battle with the unstoppable symbolic beast at the climax of the story. This either describes a Godzilla plot or Melville's classic novel. Considering that Godzilla has represented many things over the years -from nuclear anxiety to the destructive power of nature personified- so why couldn't he step in for The Whale and represent the Almighty Him/Her/Itself? Puts the God back in Godzilla, so to speak.
Tossing out Max in favor of Godzilla pretty much wrecks the narrative flow of Maurice Sendak's story, but we're discussing high concept here, not literary merit. In this version of the story, Godzilla would extend his reign as King of the Monsters to being King of the Wild Things as well. The book's themes of maturity and free will get the boot in favor of an ending that features a free-for-all slugfest in the middle of Tokyo.
There's no doubt that Citizen Kane is the greatest movie ever made. From the epic tragic sweep of the story and it's commentary on the human condition, to the revolutionary cinematography and directing style, this is the film that set the standard by which all other films are judged. There are only two things areas of the movie-going experience that Citizen Kane doesn't touch upon. The first is the zany teen sex comedy. This area could of been covered by recounting an episode out of the college days of Charles Kane and Jedediah Leland when they were on Spring Break in Florida. The only other thing that Citizen Kane is lacking is an attack by a giant monster. It's fortunate that Orson Welles had enough foresight not to explore these two genres in the film, otherwise the entire movie going experience would be encapsulated in one film, rendering all other movies that followed it moot.
It's Toho studios biggest monster verses one of the most innocent creations to come out of Studio Ghibli. Just take one of the old scripts where Godzilla dukes it out with Mothra, replace the name 'Mothra' with 'Totoro' and -ta da!- you have a brand new script that will work perfectly. Mothra is some sort of fantastic magical creature that lives in harmony with nature, Totoro is the same sort of deal, Mothra has two tiny women that follow her around, Totoro has two young girls who can see him... it's a bit spooky how much these two ideas intersect.
I have no idea what the plot would be, but at least it would give Peter Weller work.
Okay in this scenerio Godzilla goes up against a basketball player in a battle of... oh nevermind, that's just too dumb to consider.
If you want to comment on any of the above silliness, drop me a line at gleep9@hotmail.com. If you're done here, lumber on back to the Godzilla page.
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