The US military interposes itself into an ancient conflict between combatants its leaders understand poorly if at all, in response to a devastating attack by one of the antagonists on American soil. The best efforts of the most dedicated common soldier fail to resolve or even to contain the battle, and ultimately make things significantly worse, partly because their commanders insist on a delusionally misguided strategy, and partly because high-tech firepower is simply the wrong tool for the job in the first place. Experts in the relevant fields are sidelined, ignored, and even treated like criminals while the authorities make bullets and bombs their first and only resort. And in the end, there’s no practical solution but to get out of the way while the old enemies duke it out— even if getting out of the way means accepting the risk of becoming collateral casualties in the fight. Oh— and along the way, the expected smashing of famous skyscrapers comes packaged with whole squadrons of airplanes falling out of the sky and exploding on impact against the crumbling concrete towers. Did Edwards and Borenstein deliberately set out to render thirteen years’ worth of military, diplomatic, and foreign-policy fiasco in the Middle East as kaiju eiga? I don’t know. But I do know that the atom bomb is yesterday’s nightmare, and that each era tends to get the monsters it needs in turn.
Scott Ashlin unsurprisingly knocking it out of the park with his Godzilla (2014) review (x)
