5 Kaiju Movies That Are 10/10, No Notes

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Since almost as far back as cinema goes, people have liked watching big creatures stomp around on screen. The Lost World (1925) was a definitive early dinosaur movie, and even if they’re not monsters necessarily, they kind of serve the same purpose in an action/adventure or horror kind of movie. Then there was King Kong (1933), and he’s endured in ways that are obvious, because that story is timeless, movie apes of any size are cool and fun, and because King Kong is always the sort of thing you can remake or rework and show off whatever special effects are cutting-edge at the time of production.

But are those movies kaiju films? Some might say King Kong is, and certainly, King Kong has had some crossovers with – and battles against – the most legendary of all the big screen kaiju, but for this ranking, we’re going to go with a narrow definition of “kaiju movie.” Any giant monster movie from Japan, or influenced by the Japanese monster movies that started getting popular in the 1950s onwards, counts as a kaiju movie. Oh, and the monster has to be huge; like, as in multiple storeys high. This is the one thing that keeps The Host (2006) from appearing here (though that is an excellent monster movie and the creature there is plenty big for the story being told… just not as comparable “kaiju-sized” as the other monsters featured in the movies below).

5

‘Godzilla vs. Destoroyah’ (1995)

Yes, Godzilla is going to show up a few times here, and the first movie in that series being mentioned is one of its saddest, and one that might’ve felt, in 1995, like the end of the series as a whole. It’s Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, which concludes the Heisei era of Godzilla movies, which began in 1984 with The Return of Godzilla. There were five movies between that one and Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, and the sense of continuity from film to film is surprisingly strong, and there is a definite arc for Godzilla and the way humanity sees/treats him. He also gets an adoptive son in the final three movies of the Heisei era, Godzilla Junior, and he’s not as irritating/silly as Godzilla’s adopted son from the Showa era, Minilla.

Godzilla vs. Destoroyah is pretty thrilling and exciting, and easily one of the best Godzilla films.

You get attached to both Godzilla Senior and Junior, which makes them going up against Destoroyah all the more traumatic, since he’s one of the most powerful monsters in the history of the Godzilla series. Oh, and in Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, Godzilla (Senior) is also melting down, basically being like a nuclear reactor with legs, so that makes the stakes feel unbearably high, and some of the more intense scenes feel genuinely somber. That might make it sound like a downer, but Godzilla vs. Destoroyah is still pretty thrilling and exciting, and easily one of the best Godzilla films. It’s genuinely great science fiction, and represented new heights, at least on an emotional front, for the franchise (and maybe even kaiju movies more generally).

4

‘Pacific Rim’ (2013)

Though it might have been logical to restrict “kaiju movies” to ones made in Japan, Pacific Rim was just too good to leave out. Also, the giant monsters that are a threat in this movie are officially labeled as kaiju, in-universe, so it makes sense for Pacific Rim to be a kaiju movie in more than one way. Further, though it wasn’t a Japanese production, and Guillermo del Toro is not a Japanese filmmaker, Pacific Rim is spiritually in line with a good deal of Japanese entertainment, and not just classic kaiju movies. See, to fight the kaiju, humanity has constructed giant pilotable robots, and they function like mechs, and there are, of course, plenty of shows and movies (particularly of the animated kind) about mechs from Japan, so that checks out further.

Pacific Rim is a good-hearted movie, and it just wants you to have fun. The humans are mostly all good people, and the ones who aren’t so great learn the errors of their ways and stuff, so the movie’s ultimately rather idealistic. Plus, the monsters are unambiguously monstrous and need to be stopped via a punch or two or three-hundred to the face(s) with a big metallic fist. Or an oil tanker. Deploy a sword, why not? Pacific Rim is big, goofy, silly, and quintessentially crowd-pleasing. Well, it should’ve been. It didn’t set the box office ablaze necessarily, but it had enough of a fanbase to get a sequel in 2018, and that sequel was, unfortunately, a waste of time. It seemed to kill momentum for further movies. Oh, well. At least we’ll always have the rather perfect original film.

3

‘Godzilla Minus One’ (2023)

At the time of writing, Godzilla Minus One is the most recent Japanese film in the Godzilla series, and already feels worthy of being considered one of the very best. It had that kind of well-deserved impressive reputation almost straight away, just because it’s very no-nonsense and broadly approachable in a way few kaiju movies have ever been. Well, to be fair, some of the broader kaiju movies have been rather silly and hard to get invested in on any sort of dramatic front, but that’s not an issue with Godzilla Minus One. You understand the stakes here straight away, and feel the desperation of everyone in Japan, while recovering from the end of World War II, having to go right into dealing with the emergence of Godzilla.

The first movie also took place not long after the end of World War II, but not as close as the period Godzilla Minus One ended up being set in. It goes a long way toward making the scenes without anything by way of monsters feel particularly engrossing, as in Godzilla Minus One is a good character-driven drama alongside being an exciting giant monster movie with all the thrills and action that often come with such a genre. It’s the best of both worlds, or if there are multiple worlds/genres here, then it’s the best of all the worlds. If you’re new to Godzilla, or are only familiar with the American movies and want to get a handle on the Japanese side of the series, the best place to start is either at the start, or with Godzilla Minus One. It really is that good and essential.

2

‘Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris’ (1999)

Image via Toho

The 1990s was a wonderful time for Gamera, since that’s the only decade in the monster’s history when he didn’t just stand alongside Godzilla, but might well have even trumped him for a bit, after having existed in Godzilla’s shadow for about three decades prior. The trilogy from 1995 to 1999 was responsible for that, with these movies doing what the Heisei era did for Godzilla, but with more consistency and what felt like purposeful planning from movie to movie. Each one builds on the other immensely, so you can’t really watch and appreciate Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris without first watching Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995) and Gamera 2: Attack of Legion (1996).

So, consider those two movies honorably mentioned. They get the ball rolling with a newer take on Gamera that makes the giant turtle-like kaiju a good deal more interesting, and even one you can take seriously, at least by giant monster movie standards. Gamera feels like a real force of nature in Gamera 3, in particular, and it almost does for Gamera what Godzilla vs. Destoroyah achieved for Godzilla. There is a ton of spectacle and charm in this movie, and with the two Gamera movies that preceded it, making the trilogy a no-brainer of a recommendation for anyone who’s even just a little fond of Godzilla and keen to see some more kaiju movies that don’t involve the King of the Monsters himself.

1

‘Godzilla’ (1954)

Godzilla in the original 1954 movie staring down the Japanese army and reading for combat

Finishing with the start of things might seem backwards, but Godzilla (1954) deserves to be held in particularly high regard, and thereby saved until the end here, crowned as the best of all the kaiju movies. With the greatest handful of movies in this long-running series, you can, like, pick six, assign them all a number from 1 to 6, then roll a die, and pick whichever one’s the luckiest. There are maybe half-a-dozen Godzilla movies that could’ve gone here. But for now, it’s the original, which was so instrumental in the development of the whole kaiju genre, as it’s now understood. It also came out during an incredible year for Japanese cinema, so it’s honestly important and historically/culturally significant beyond the realm of the giant monster movie.

1954’s Godzilla stands out for how grim and horror-focused it is, with Godzilla being equal parts tragic and terrifying. Later Godzilla movies like Shin Godzilla sometimes had him being more tragic, and then you’ve also got movies like Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack, where he’s not really tragic, and is instead more just terrifying. This original film, though, gets the balance right, and while there is some spectacle here, the heaviness is what really sticks with you, and it’s something you can still feel 70+ years later, even with the knowledge that it kick-started a series where, eventually, the titular monster did some absolutely crazy things (flying kick in Godzilla vs. Megalon, anyone?).