DIY VIRAL
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Ishiro Honda's original Gojira film was released in Japan in 1954 and helped popularize the giant monster movie genre, which remained popular for seven decades. Godzilla movies are still being made to this day, with Toho's latest film “Godzilla Minus One” will be released in 2023, while the legendary movie “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” will be released in 2024. Godzilla has been a part of the cinematic landscape for so long, his popularity has risen, fallen and risen again. The Godzilla series has had several “finales” and just as many reboots. He's more flexible and prone to reboots than James Bond.
From 1954 to 1975, Godzilla more or less followed a single continuity, and the 15 films released during this period are considered to be from the Showa era. There were no theatrical Godzilla films between 1975 and 1983, and the series restarted in 1984 with the release of Koji Hashimoto's The Return of Godzilla, a direct sequel to the 1954 original that skipped all 14 sequels. The seven films released between 1984 and 1995 are considered part of the Heisei era.
Toho has always protected Godzilla and its favorite monster in licenses only under special circumstances. It was important that if another company were to make a Godzilla film, it would be a high-profile film with a budget to match and impressive production values. It seems that back in 1983, American filmmaker Steve Miner had signed a co-financing deal with Toho to make his own Godzilla movie. Miner was best known as a slasher director in 1983 with Friday the 13th Part II and Friday the 13th Part III.
Steve Rifle's book chronicles the miner's journey to develop his own Godzilla movie, which will be titled Godzilla: King of the Monsters in 3D. “Japan's Favorite Mon-Star: The Big G's Unauthorized Biography.”
Steve Miner developed his own Godzilla film in 1983
The story goes that Miner was a huge Godzilla fan and worked on the first American-produced Godzilla movie himself. He showed his treatment to higher-ups and Toho, and surprisingly, they agreed to co-finance it. Miner's only task was to create a script and get an American studio to agree to finance the remainder of the film.
The script was the easy part. Miner hired Fred Decker to write the screenplay. Dekker's name is well known to fans of the genre, as he went on to write “The Night of Creeps”, “The Monster Squad” and “RoboCop 3”. Miner asked Decker to write “Godzilla: King of the Monsters in 3-D” specifically because he was not a Godzilla fan; Miner needed someone to focus more on story and structure than fan service. Dekker agreed and came up with a traditional Godzilla story, rebooting the franchise from scratch.
About the early days of the project, Miner said:
“I've always been a fan since I was a kid. Seeing it as an adult, I knew it could be made into a good movie. My original idea was to do it in 3D. I just did it.Friday the 13th in 3Dand wanted to make a good movie in 3D and I thought miniatures could make good 3D effects. So it was a combination of trying to make a really good monster movie and doing it in 3D. I had to get the rights, so I went to Japan and made a deal with the people at Toho to co-finance the development of the project, myself and Toho.”
Everything was set.
What would have happened in the 1983 Godzilla movie and why was it cancelled?
In the scenario, a passing meteor triggers an automated nuclear strike, causing an explosion in the South Pacific. The bomb appears to awaken a long-dormant underwater monster—Godzilla—which gradually makes its way onto the US coast over the course of the film. The monster, as the human heroes later learn, is looking for her dead baby, rescued from the ocean by the military. The climax was on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco.
Dekker was said to have modeled his script less on the Godzilla films and more on the then new rise of high-end adventure films by the likes of Steven Spielberg. Dekker was quoted in Japan's Favorite Mon-Star as saying that he wanted the film to feel like a James Bond film; something slick and exciting that doesn't just depend on the monster. He specifically said he didn't want his film to be “cheesy”. Miner reportedly approached Powers Boothe about appearing in the film, as well as a very young Demi Moore, then a rising star best known for the monster movie Parasite. Miner even commissioned a script for Monsters in 3-D and hired several notable artists to create his film and design a new version of Godzilla. David W. Allen was to provide the suspension effects for Godzilla, and Rick Baker was hired (but did not work) with the animatronic Godzilla head.
However, the project was canceled when Miner could not find an American studio willing to spend the millions needed to make it happen. The budget at the time was supposed to be $30 million, and Miner had yet to prove he could handle that kind of budget. After that, Toho began working on its 1984 film, The Return of Godzilla, and interest shifted. The film just fell flat.
Miner, thankfully, continued to make interesting horror films. He moved on to House, then the excellent Warlock, Michael Myers' Halloween H20: 20 Years Later. and the giant gator movie “Lake Placid.” Maybe someone would let him make a Godzilla movie now.
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DIY VIRAL
