Godzilla vs. Mothra: The Battle For Earth

Godzilla vs. Mothra: The Battle for Earth (Gojira vs. Mosura) (1992)

Runtime: 102 minutes

Directed by: Takao Okawara

Starring: Tetsuya Bessho, Satomi Kobayashi, Takehiro Murata, Saburo Shinoda, Akiji Kobayashi

From: Toho

Finally, I have watched another Godzilla picture. It's been a long while. Thankfully this was something I enjoyed. I write all about it below:

I recently looked at my Lists and realized that aside from doing a new review of King Kong vs. Godzilla because I was able to see the original Toho cut so I could compare it with the American cut, I haven't watched a Godzilla picture in over a year. I figured it was long overdue for me to do a review of one, and this happens to be a movie I had never seen before.

In this timeline the franchise uses (where the only movies that are canon are the original, The Return of Godzilla, Godzilla vs. Biollante, and Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah), Mothra is making its debut so they borrow quite a bit from the original Mothra film back in the early 60's and they take a little from 1964's Mothra. A meteor strikes the Earth and causes a lot of problems, including reawakening The Big G. Mothra is discovered and those tiny Japanese twins are taken to Tokyo, making Mothra PISSED. There's also the critter either known as Battra or Black Mothra; both names are awesome. That revolves around the favorite conspiracy theory of some, which is how many thousands of years ago there was a more advanced civilization on Earth than what we presently have now, but it got destroyed. Anyhow, all three kaiju do battle with each other and we get plenty of men in rubber suits or puppets tromping around with each other or destroying nicely constructed miniature sets.

The movie is on the wacky side. After all, certain scenes from the Indiana Jones franchise are lifted and an important male character you first see dress like Indy and basically is Indy... if Dr. Jones was a jerk who was only a thief and not an archaeologist. As it's the early 90's, Not Indy is a divorced dad who doesn't pay alimony (naturally, he has a cute young daughter) and he is forced to work with his ex. In addition, this is really something from the late 80's and early 90's as they are not subtle at all about delivering a pro environmental message.

Sure, you could carp about various little niggles and the focus is more on the two Mothra creatures than on Godzilla; I say that this is still entertaining. Akira Takarada appears (one of the six films in the franchise you get to see him in) and it's always nice to hear a score from Akira Ifukube. I promise that it won't be another year before I discuss another Gojira picture.