‘Godzilla’ Gets A Director
Published by Seth Quillen in: Film -- Date: 6 Jan 2011 Comments: 0
After Legendary Pictures announced last march that they would be rebooting the Godzilla franchise, they have finally picked a director.
Gareth Edwards, the British filmmaker who wrote and directed the indie sci-fi movie Monsters, is closing a deal to develop and direct the new Godzilla film. Legendary’s Thomas Tull and Jon Jashni are producing along with Dan Lin, Roy Lee, and Brian Rogers.
Edwards’ Monsters was made with a budget in the low six figures. It centered on two characters traveling through a Mexico that is now a quarantine zone due to an alien-monster infestation. Monsterscreatively only showed parts of the aliens during the movie, with tentacles attacking cars and people during the night, reminiscent of the first hour of Speilberg’s 1975 Jaws.
A writer has not yet been found to help Edwards flesh out the story and script of the Godzilla revamp but there has been some work done by original writer David Callaham (The Expendables).
Initially, I was not that excited about rehashing a played out Godzilla origin story but Edwards creative style is slowly changing my mind. Additionally, I’m a huge fan of giving small time directors big projects. We saw great results with Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings, Sam Raimi’s first couple Spider-Man movies, Christopher Nolan’s Batman Beginsand most recently with Neill Blomkamp’s District 9.
Last thing, I’d really like to see one of Godzilla’s enemies make it to this film, how about Megaguirus, Mechagodzilla or even his biggest foe, Mothra. Give us a chance to root for Godzilla to kick some serious butt before he is inevitably killed by that evil and misunderstanding U.S. Military.
Gareth Edwards, Monsters the U.S. in October. (Heat Vision)
