Gojira: A Multinational Box Office Hit
Weather you’ve watched the movies or not, Gojira (or it’s more recognizable American name, Godzilla) is undoubtedly a household name at this point in his career. Especially with the rise in popularity with the franchise in the last few years with a number of huge productions and another installment on the way in just over a month. And although this creature’s origin is credited to Japan and not the States, Godzilla has become such an iconic and popular story in the US ever since he was created.
For the American audience, it’s pretty easy to understand why we love to watch Godzilla storm through cities and fight other monsters. It’s simply because we love action movies and this franchise brings almost every aspect of action you could think of to the screen. Specifically in the 50’s when the original Godzilla film was released, it’s American remake became very popular due to it’s similarities to the recent Hollywood film King Kong by Merian C. Cooper. This coupled with it’s higher production quality compared to the standard Japanese film of the time made it fit right in with the general American audience. And even though we can credit Godzilla’s popularity to purely being “a cool big monster”, there are many other ties between Japan and the US that potentially cleared a path between these two cinematic cultures.
For example, Godzilla’s origin was due to the American nuclear bomb testing in the South Pacific at the time. This could have given a sense of familiarity to the American audience since their own country had a sort of cameo in this foreign film. On top of that, the US left it’s occupation of the Japanese state following the second World War only two years prior to the film’s release in Japan, so once it reached the US, the public still had Japan fresh on their mind. If you include the general fear of nuclear weapons in America and across the globe due to the beginning of the Cold War, Godilla’s hints of an anti-nuclear agenda could have held a deep resonance with any audience that held a negative opinion on the nuclear issues.
Because of Godzilla’s arrival to the United States having deep roots in the political climate of the world as well as sharing many similarities to American cinema, it’s no wonder how the giant monster became a success even 67 years later.
