“Godzilla Minus One” arrived late to U.S. cinemas. In the box office, it broke multiple foreign film records and quickly gained notoriety, all on a relatively shoestring, $15 million dollar budget.

In the genre of monster movies, it transcended messy narratives and almost comedic action sequences to deliver both an artful and thrilling experience, and in the legacy of Godzilla, it is not only a uniquely terrifying and moving addition but also stands as perhaps the greatest Godzilla movie to ever exist. It was able to achieve this level of excellence largely by perfecting and balancing the two biggest parts of any Godzilla movie: the human story and Godzilla action.

“Godzilla Minus One” creates an excellent human story by crafting characters that actually seem like real people instead of cannon fodder for Godzilla’s famed atomic breath. The human story follows Kōichi Shikishima, a Japanese suicide pilot who has to evade Godzilla in post-war Japan, while struggling with his own demons. The actor who portrays Shikishima, Ryunosuke Kamiki, is startlingly good at portraying a broken, shell-shocked man grappling with multiple threats to his life, both physical and mental. The film also creates many compelling and memorable side characters who follow their own stories, a rarity in a genre peppered with flat, static human characters. Together, Kamiki’s outstanding performance and the strong writing surrounding him and other actors make the human story not just a sidebar to the monster action, but an integral part of the Godzilla experience.

This characterization bleeds directly into the namesake of the movie himself, for all the character work has a dark, ulterior motive. By getting the audience attached to the human characters, the audience’s hearts collectively drop when Godzilla comes to town. The dread surrounding the monster is one of the movie’s strongest suits, but it does it in a seemingly counterintuitive way, by making Godzilla look vulnerable. By convincingly showing Godzilla to be injured or even dead, the film makes it all the more horrifying when the beast rises from the ashes again. And when Godzilla does defy humanity’s best efforts, the titular character pulls no punches in return, relentlessly pursuing his targets in ferocious and unpredictable ways, much like the T-Rex in Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park.”

Despite current day cinema being filled with massive CGI wars and carnage, “Godzilla Minus One” manages to make wholesale annihilation fresh and raw, leaving audience members pressed back into their seats trying to get away from the smoldering rampage. The pure evil inside this Godzilla incarnation makes the audience want the monster dead, adding real tension to the film as the heroes we have grown attached to try desperately to kill the seemingly invincible monster.

With these two key ingredients, “Godzilla Minus One” was able to do something that other big-budget Hollywood films of 2023 did not: create a cohesive and fulfilling theme. In contrast to the savage destruction present throughout the film, “Godzilla Minus One” extolls the messages of faith in humanity and a belief in life, even in the face of insurmountable odds.

There are a few caveats to the film, of course. Despite the creators’ best efforts, the human side of “Godzilla Minus One” can drag in some moments of the film. Additionally, the CGI of the film can look spotty in certain snapshots, although in comparison to the special effects of other 2023 action movies, it looks fantastic.

For those looking purely for a monster cage match, or those expecting CGI perfection in every frame of the film, “Godzilla Minus One” might not be the one to see. However, the movie’s commitment to a gripping plot, bleak emotional moments, spine-chilling destruction and a poignant message makes the film a contender for one of the best films of the year, and possibly even the greatest Godzilla film. At the very least, it is a thought-provoking yet action-packed piece for those unfamiliar with the giant lizard and a must-watch for any Godzilla fan.

This story was originally published on The Delphi on December 28, 2023.