Godzilla vs Kong: Film Review

Cast: Rebecca Hall, Alexander Skarsgard, Millie Bobby Brown, Brian Tyree Henry, Eiza Gonzalez, Demian Bichir, Julian Dennison, Kong, Godzilla

Director: Adam Wingard

Sometimes a film does little more than it says on the tin.

Godzilla vs Kong is one such film.

The latest addition to the MonsterVerse franchise, Adam Wingard's neon-soaked smackdown is likely to appease fans of Kaiju CGI mayhem and to be frank, hardly anyone else.

In Godzilla vs Kong, following on from Kong: Skull Island, the ape is contained but unhappy with life. Elsewhere across the globe, in a seemingly unprovoked move after years of peace, Godzilla attacks an institution, leading to fears the monster has risen up.

So in a desperate attempt to harness the energy that lives below in the Hollow Earth dimension, scientist Dr Nathan Lind (an understated Skarsgard) decides to try and use Kong to help him - but soon Godzilla is on the warpath and coming for Kong.

It's no lie to say that the human elements of Godzilla vs Kong are once again on the weak side.

There's scant little plot of any kind of depth in the latest from the MonsterVerse, but Wingard does manage to cobble together what could easily be said is one of the best looking movies of the MonsterVerse, with plenty of daytime mayhem to satiate fans.

With character split into factions, and groups, the film's choppy nature sometimes means there's a major disconnect on the emotional front ahead of the flat CGI spectacle. Wingard's less interested in mining the character elements and more in creating a big dumb, in your face blockbuster that delivers simply on a promise of two titans fighting it out (even early titles refer to them as ancient enemies before underscoring it on the screen for unnecessary emphasis.)

And in fairness, it's here that Godzilla vs Kong delivers.

Clear-cut action sequences provide the thrills, and Wingard's camera captures it all with a deft sensibility and an eye for the visuals. Unlike previous films which have concentrated on the murkier side of the showdowns, Wingard's MonsterVerse is a brightly lit affair, with a final showdown in a neon-soaked Hong Kong providing a clarity of clashes that makes it entertaining to watch.

At its heart though, Godzilla vs Kong is a hollow CGI spectacle that will appease Kaiju diehards. The overblown rubble-strewn destruction has fast become a lazy trope but here, it's a necessary one. It doesn't feel like they know how to incorporate the human characters into the action - and the film's at its weakest when it zeroes in on them.

However, it's in its quieter moments that Wingard's film finds its feet.

Whether it's the Land that Time Forgot feel of the Hollow Earth made fantastically real on the screen, the emotional depth of a girl's relationship with Kong (the more rounded titan of the film) or the truly impressive and evocative score from Tom Holkenborg amid a wonderfully visualised aesthetic, there are moments here to be treasured.

It's just a shame that in among all the fury and bluster, there's not enough of them to leave you feeling you've experienced a superior popcorn blockbuster aimed at getting the box office back on its feet after Covid-19 decimated all the cinematic titans.