4C
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 2015
PARTING SHOT
A weekly snapshot from The Daily Astorian and Chinook Observer photographers
Children play under the light of the moon in July at Fort Stevens State Park.
Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
ODDITY
Godzilla —
big in Japan
Director loves
all Godzilla
movies, even
the bad ones
By YURI KAGEYAMA
Associated Press
TOKYO
—
Radia-
tion-breathing Godzilla de-
stroyed so many cities and
fought so many monsters, the
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outgrew its budget and audi-
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surprise.
Shinji Higuchi, the director
and special-effects whiz chosen
by Toho Co. for the made-in-
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one-up last year’s Hollywood
version, with not only the big-
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previous ones haven’t attempt-
ed.
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the top-50 lovers of Godzilla in
the world. That’s how much I
love Godzilla,” he told The As-
sociated Press in a recent inter-
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nitely in the top 50.”
Higuchi, 49, a burly unpre-
tentious man with curly hair,
swears he loves all the Godzilla
movies, even the bad ones. He
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through, he said with a laugh.
“Godzilla had to deliver
more and more, responding to
calls from the audience, as well
as creators,” said Higuchi of the
series’ trappings.
“Godzilla went through
these stages, resetting itself, de-
veloping and then succumbing
to exhaustion, until it just got so
big it had to stop.”
$QGVR+LJXFKLSODQVWRNHHS
his Godzilla, in a sense, simple,
stripped to the essentials.
A terrifying Godzilla
But presenting more of the
same on the silver screen isn’t
for Higuchi, who built his career
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ster movies, such as the 1990s
“Gamera” series and the 1984
“Godzilla.”
Higuchi also directed the
more somber 2006 “Japan
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fects to show temples and hills
immersing into the sea.
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is under strict orders not to dis-
close details of “Godzilla,” set
for release next year. But he
is promising the most terrify-
ing Godzilla that Japan’s cut-
ting-edge special-effects mov-
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Shooting begins next month,
much of it at Toho studios in To-
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will help oversee direction.
Higuchi’s
special-effects
techniques were amply demon-
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new release received favorably
in Japan.
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er graphics with manipulating
a towering doll of rippling red
muscle that resembles a giant bi-
ological anatomy chart, as well
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using actors moving through
miniatures, to depict grotesque-
ly enlarged humans.
Applying to Godzilla that
Yuriko Nakao/AP File
In this photo taken on Dec. 12, 2013 and provided by Yuriko Nakao, Japanese director Shinji Higuchi poses in front of an
abandoned apartment building during a location hunting for his film, “Attack on Titan” on Hashima Island, commonly
known as Gunkanjima, which means “Battleship Island” off Nagasaki, Nagasaki Prefecture, southern Japan. Higuchi’s
special-effects techniques were amply demonstrated in “Attack on Titan,” a new release received favorably in Japan.
nature screech was based on the
sound of a cello.
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as it is pronounced in Japanese,
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Budget buster
jira,” or “whale” — emerged
7RKR PDGH ¿OPV LQ WKH from nuclear testing in the Pacif-
Godzilla series, but ended it LF2FHDQPDNLQJWKHGLQRVDXULF
when the budget spiraled out of creature resonate with a univer-
control, despite a dwindling au- VDOSDFL¿VWPHVVDJH
dience.
The man-in-a-rubber-suit
,WWRRNWKHSRSXODULW\RI*D- crashed through more cities and
reth Edwards’ 2014 “Godzil- fought various cartoonish mon-
la,” which Higuchi praised as a sters until the last Godzilla in
masterpiece, to get the Japanese 2004.
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Higuchi insists his new
renew the series. Hollywood is Godzilla won’t be the cuddly
planning its own sequel in 2018. NLWVFKNDLMXKLVJHQHUDWLRQJUHZ
The story of the reptilian mu- up on.
tation began with the 1954 clas-
The world has lost too much
sic, in which an actor wearing a of its innocence after the 9/11
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a carefully crafted miniature of the 3/11 tsunami and nuclear
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nously memorable score. Its sig- eastern Japan, with the arrival of
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guchi calls “hybrid,” has never
been attempted in Japan. Higu-
chi is promising just that.
deliver wonders, given the lim-
itations. Hollywood movies can
count on million-dollar budgets,
but even the most expensive
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third of a million dollars, said
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“Godzilla is Toho’s top
content. To be the director of
Godzilla is a great honor. And
he is under pressure to live up
to huge expectations,” added
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almost caved into the Godzil-
la-size pressure and declined the
offer to direct.
High hopes
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)LOP FULWLF <XLFKL 0DHGD ing a very primitive form. Just
said fans have high hopes for a giant lizard. But it’s shoulder-
Higuchi’s “Godzilla,” because ing so much,” said Higuchi of
of the director’s reputation for *RG]LOOD¶VDZHHYRNLQJSRZHUV
“Perhaps we are all wait-
special effects, as well as for his
ing for that horrible thing that’s
love of Godzilla.
But Higuchi will need to within us that we fear.”
“the real monsters of the world,”
he said.
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sters encapsulate a long-lost era,
when the world had enjoyed
relative peace, over the decades
after World War II, especially in
insular Japan.
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a new Godzilla,” Higuchi said
quietly.
In movie after movie, peo-
ple merely ran away from the
stampeding monster, and no one
tried to face up to the issue of ac-
countability, he said.
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