Godzilla, the Monster of the Pacific Ocean

The story of a monster surfacing on Tokyo is told through the eyes of the American reporter Steve Martin. He happens to be in the city, lives through the attack and relays what is happening by radio. This film is the 1954 Gojira re-edited for America. Newly shot Raymond Burr scenes were cut in, stand-ins were used in some shots of the Japanese actors, and a great deal of the original, particularly the passages looking directly at nuclear testing and post-war Japan, was removed. The film is not interested in the monster. It is interested in the intermediary: the audience sees events only as far as a foreigner narrates them, and most of what Gojira said to its own country is lost in the relay. Terry O. Morse directed the new scenes; the original film is Ishirō Honda's. It opened in America in 1956, then travelled back to Japan and screened there on 29 May 1957 as Kaijū Ō Gojira. Japanese audiences watched the American version of their own film as a separate release. Who it is for: viewers curious about the history of the Godzilla series and the gap between the two versions. Who it is not for: anyone looking for the original. This cut is shorter, softer and has stripped out most of the film's political weight.