Review: A Godzilla Movie About Bureaucracy

When a strange aquatic creature appears in Tokyo Bay, Japanese officials assure the public that there is no reason to worry that it could wreak havoc on shore.

Moments later, the creature is demolishing part of Tokyo.

Shin Godzilla, an acclaimed 2016 film that was briefly re-released in American theaters in August, is an unusual entry in the 71-year kaiju franchise. Directors Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi reimagined the traditional Godzilla-stomps-Japan story as a biting satire of bureaucracy, with much of the action centered on government officials who hold meeting after meeting after meeting to discuss what to do—all while Tokyo gets wrecked in the background. The heroes, a group of outcast scientists, must overcome both the red tape and the green monster.

When it was first released, Shin Godzilla was a timely commentary on the Japanese government’s response to the 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and subsequent crisis at the Fukushima power plant. (Godzilla’s first emergence here powerfully recalls the tsunami’s horror.) But it contains a timeless lesson too: When incompetent leaders face unexpected emergencies, expect chaos and calamity.