John Scalzi has an article about SF movies over at SciFi Scanner, and he makes an interesting observation: In science fiction, unlike every other movie genre, “classic” does not automatically equal “good.”
Gojira and its dozens of sequels are so bad that if there was any honesty in the world, people would have to admit that the universally-reviled 1998 Roland Emmerich version is actually the best-written, best-acted, best-produced Godzilla film ever made. No one will ever admit this, ever (except for me, and maybe, if he’s drunk enough, Roland Emmerich), but there it is. Gojira is a classic science fiction film. Gojira stinks.
He’s got lots of other examples. And he’s right: For every Blade Runner, there’s a Logan’s Run.
The comments thread is interesting, too.
One response to “Y’Know, He’s Got a Point”
If he had a point, I didn’t find in the above excerpt. . . Or for that matter, the article. Best written? Yeah, right. In the Japanese films the reason for Godzilla’s frequent visitations to Japan shifted from “he’s returning to its ancestral breeding grounds” to “he keeps coming back to feed off of the nuclear power plants, and knows he can find food in Japan.” Either explanation makes more sense than a big cold-blooded lizard swimming to colder waters to nest, of all things. The American movie really didn’t care to justify anything that the creature did at all, it was just a really big McGuffin.
Best-acted? If we’re throwing Takashi Shimura and Matthew Broderick in the ring together, I’m taking Shimura’s side.
Best produced. No argument there. So, this guy’s whole argument boils down to that they spent more cash on the American Godzilla. Whoopy. They spent $200 million on Terminator: Salvation. Now compare that to the $6 million spent on the original Terminator, and tell me which was the better movie?