It’s sometimes hard to define sub-genres, but here goes nothing. A kaiju movie is basically a monster movie, but it’s about a very large monster. Or a kaiju movie can be about more than one very large monster, of course. The term is sometimes used only in relation to Japanese giant monster movies, with Godzilla (and all its sequels) being the big kahuna, so to speak, but the sub-genre’s big enough for more than just the king of the monsters.
Essentially, though, most traditional kaiju movies have been made in Japan, but there are a few that can be called kaiju movies – or are spiritually/stylistically in line with kaiju movies – made outside Japan. The following will hopefully demonstrate this, as they’re all English-language movies. And the monsters do have to be considerably larger than the human beings who they ultimately endanger for the films to be counted here (sorry, Jaws, Predator, and any adaptation of Frankenstein).
9
‘Cloverfield’ (2008)
The whole found footage approach to the giant monster movie sub-genre was what made Cloverfield stand out back in 2008… well, that and the viral marketing, which emphasized mystery and proved pretty damn intriguing. Once you get past the head-spinning presentation, though (those with motion sickness should still sit this one out, unless you watch it on a tiny screen), Cloverfield is largely business as usual for a kaiju film.
Once you get past the head-spinning presentation, Cloverfield is largely business as usual, by the sub-genre’s standards.
There’s a big creature that wreaks havoc in New York City, and a group of fairly simple characters who need to survive, and one of them has a video camera, thereby documenting basically the whole thing. You can imagine what such a movie would look like, in your head, and then watch Cloverfield and find it’s probably similar and altogether not too surprising, but still, it’s got some things going for it as a very 2000s-era giant monster movie.
8
‘Colossal’ (2016)
Colossal is a novel giant monster movie in the sense that it’s not really about action or adventure elements, and it’s not exactly a horror/disaster movie like some other movies about big monsters are. It’s kind of a psychological dramedy that’s also a kaiju film, since it’s about a woman who blacks out and seems to turn into a giant monster whenever she does.
You sort of just have to go with it, but it’s worth going with, as Colossal is really quite distinctive. There’s a level of experimentation with the genre’s conventions here that goes beyond Cloverfield and its different kind of presentation, because Colossal is more removed from traditional kaiju stuff, though not in a bad way, so long as you’re open to something that’s surprisingly introspective.
7
‘Q’ (1982)
The title “Q” is pretty ambiguous, but the alternate title of Q: The Winged Serpent gives you slightly more of an idea of what you’re in for, though not entirely. There is a big old winged serpent kind of creature that’s flying around and putting people’s lives in danger, but also, Q is a crime movie of sorts about the hunt for a potential serial killer, and then it shifts into being a monster movie.
It’s bizarre, and yet even more bizarrely, it kind of works, if you’re willing to go along with something that plays by its own bizarre rules. Q is undoubtedly rough around the edges, yet how could it not be, when it’s a crime/mystery/monster movie that’s got some real B-grade sensibilities, and quite a bit of stuff that also makes it a borderline exploitation movie. You (maybe?) love to see it.
6
‘King Kong’ (2005)
Okay, something no-nonsense now, to show how there are non-Japanese filmmakers who are willing to have a bit of fun/escapism with kaiju-esque films. Here’s 2005’s King Kong, which is a remake of a proto-kaiju movie (in a sense) that will be mentioned in a little while, though maybe the term “expansion” is more accurate than “remake,” since this is just a king-sized King Kong, at about double the length.
It’s a Peter Jackson movie, and he definitely doesn’t mind making films that exceed 2.5 hours, albeit there’s not quite as much of a reason to do so with King Kong than there was with, say, the films in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. King Kong (2005) does get exhausting, at a point, but there’s enough here that’s impressive and able to deliver by way of spectacle to make it worth a watch, once you find enough time to sit down and take the whole gargantuan thing in.
5
‘Godzilla’ (2014)
Not the best movie called Godzilla, but also not the worst, Godzilla (2014) kicked off the MonsterVerse and helped contribute to a kaiju renaissance of sorts that began in the 2010s, and then really kicked into high gear by the 2020s. Some of the American productions helped with that for sure, but also, some of the best Japanese Godzilla movies were released around this time as well (like Shin Godzilla and Godzilla Minus One).
With 2014’s Godzilla, nothing’s too complicated, with the plot being about a clash between monsters (one of them indeed being the titular one) and how it impacts people on the ground. Some might feel there’s a bit too much by way of focus on the non-monsters, and certain action sequences are teased or not really shown all that clearly, but the finale delivers, at least, and Godzilla (2014) largely does a good job at emphasizing the immense size of all the monsters within it.
4
‘Godzilla vs. Kong’ (2021)
While it’s a much dopier movie than Godzilla (2014), Godzilla vs. Kong is arguably more fun, and there’s also an argument to be made that it’s the best of the MonsterVerse movies so far. It does exactly what you’d expect it to do, with a title that promises a fight between Godzilla and King Kong, and really, does anything else but that conflict matter much?
Nope. Well, if you want to care about anything else, you’ll be left disappointed or maybe even a bit bored by some of this movie, though if you just want mindless entertainment, and are willing to laugh at something silly, Godzilla vs. Kong has got your back. And, to its credit, though it’s not perfectly paced, it does generally feel like it’s trying to get through the boring stuff pretty fast, so one gets the sense the people behind this largely knew what the masses wanted.
3
‘The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms’ (1953)
Why include The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms here and not Jurassic Park? The latter could be counted as a monster movie, and the “monsters” are big, but the dangerous ones aren’t quite kaiju-sized. You might think they are, but nah, not for the writer. Honorable mention, though. Anyway, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms also has a dinosaur as its monster, but it’s sufficiently sized, for present purposes.
Also, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms came out one year before Godzilla, and was also about an atomic bomb leading to a monster rampaging through a city, so that’s neat. Godzilla was eventually more influential, but this one did technically beat it to the punch, so… yeah, it’s significant. It’s still a pretty important giant monster movie that feels better than most B-grade monster movies of the 1950s.
2
‘Pacific Rim’ (2013)
Guillermo del Toro has directed his fair share of monster movies, and he’s sometimes known for such movies asking that age-old question about “who’s the real monster?” and stuff, with it usually being man. Man is often the real monster. Except in Pacific Rim, when the monsters are the real monsters; the unambiguously evil things that need to be stopped, with things being so drastic that, for a time, humanity banded together and waged war against the invaders surprisingly united.
Pacific Rim begins with the global program – which involved building giant robots to fight the giant monsters – on its last legs, but what remains is still a multicultural team, and any disagreements between the human characters are largely sorted out, so that’s oddly wholesome. It’s one of the simpler del Toro films, as a result, but it’s so entertaining and charmingly straightforward that you don’t really miss the more insightful and thought-provoking stuff that pops up in some of his other (arguably “classier”) films.
1
‘King Kong’ (1933)
A quintessential giant monster movie, and maybe just an all-around quintessential film regardless of genre, here’s 1933’s King Kong, which pre-dated the first Godzilla by over 20 years, so that’s why it’s kind of a proto-kaiju movie. That term is more associated with Godzilla and those kinds of films that started to come out in the 1950s, but, like, it’s King Kong (1933), and you can’t not mention it.
Plot is King Kong, you know? There’s a giant ape on an island, and people survive some of the other stuff on the island before taking the giant ape back to civilization, and then all hell breaks loose. What this movie was able to accomplish on a technical front, more than 90 years ago, is honestly quite staggering, and also impressive is how well the original King Kong holds up, still feeling like the best movie to feature the titular character.
