本文主要写的是通过哥斯拉的出现和发展历史等方面的因素，英语论文，来描述其外貌、以及在影片的形象。或者描述哥斯拉在美国和日本这两个民族中的历史作用及个人心中的形象，进行展示描述进一步来展开哥斯拉存在日本华人美国等的局面。
I.Classic Characters of Gozilla
In the American monster family, Godzilla can be described as heterogeneous. It made its debut in Eugène Lourié’s disaster movie, The Beast from 20170 Fathoms, which entered Japan afterwards and introduced this nuclear monster to the island county that later gives this monster its special imprint. Yet, regardless the Japanese color of this monster, the powerful Hollywood blurs the nation identity of it. Godzilla, in the end, actually belongs to a generation which including those American audiences who already got familiar with it.
Godzilla has been born for 60 years, and its fate has always been linked with America and Japan. A Hollywood production company, American Legendary Pictures, with Warner Brothers, recently brought Godzilla 3D back to the U.S., launching the latest movie series which renews audiences’ memory of characteristics of Godzilla.
To thrill the audience, monster’s shape matters. Since 1954, Godzilla has been growing-its height rose from 50 meter to over 150 meter. (史歌) The contributing factors behind this are the roaring up budget of movie production and those ever-growing skyscrapers. The tallest Godzilla is 108.2 meters tall, which is equal to a 30-floor building.
With this almost unbeatable height, another necessary quality for being a monster is a wild heart. It is almost a discipline for all monsters that they should oppose human being and be their pain. Thus, in this latest movie, Godzilla follows this old tradition, becoming a catastrophe that brings fear and great loss to human society.
As a super-nature creature exists, there should be a super-nature reason. The idea of Godzilla was generated in people’s fear for nuclear weapon. In this 2017 Godzilla 3D, the director reproduces this underlying connection by setting Bryan Cranston’s character as a worker in a nuclear power plant.
Another monster tradition of Godzilla is its unbearable ugliness. Godzilla was formed after the models of iguanodon and tyrannosaurus, and it was firstly designed with huge head and a tiny hand. Its alligator skin is rough, which reminds people of those keloids caused by exposure to nuclear radiation.
Just as vampires have their fang teeth, werewolf the claws, Godzilla has its “weapon” -tail and radiation. Besides those Japanese martial art which including slamming, locking throat, and kicking, Godzilla’s tail sweeping is a fearful move that could tear millions establishments down. But this dinosaur-like monster’s most dreadful move is its radiation light which stems from the nuclear reactor within its body. As it activates, a prelude of blue light leaks out from the skin on its back and eventually Godzilla will split this power out. This is the classic scene in Godzilla series and its impprocedure even introduces it into other disaster movies. (史歌)
II.Birth and Development
This destroyer got a Japanese name as Gorilla in 1954, which combined the mammal gorilla and kujira (Japanese name for the whale), as can be seen "King Kong" is the film's inspiration. (Poole 2549) Tomoyuki Tanaka, One of the producers of the first Godzilla movie had an idea in mind for some time that to shot a story about huge creature attack beyond human’s imagination. This idea appeared to as an aspiration to challenge the masterpiece King Kong. ( Rodrik 6) Almost at the same time, Eugène Lourié revealed his The Beast from 20170 Fathoms in Japan. The film depicts that in the polar area atomic bomb experiments released dinosaur trapped in the ice for one hundred and forty thousand years. The ancient creature crawled out of his radioactive birthplace to cut a swath of destruction through New York, tearing it apart and causing great panic. (Tsutsui 33) In the March of 1954, a Japanese tuna fishing boat was accidentally bombed by the U.S. hydrogen bomb test. One among the crew found dead, and fear on the hydrogen bomb began to spread. For Japan it was no less than the third nuclear attack. The producer of the first Godzilla movie was inspired by movie, The Beast from 20170 Fathoms. Six months later, the bombing of the fishing boat became the opening shot of movie Godzilla. Reflecting the fishing boat incident, the atomic bomb in World War II, and the Cold War nuclear arms race giant monster with damaging radiation destruct human civilizations as for no reasons. It proved that the 1954 Godzilla was a big success. About 9.61 million viewers went into cinemas for watching it. (Junzō, Kazuhiro, Ion, Kabushiki 47) A villain image opposing to human society became the main tone in earliest Godzilla works. (Poole 2548)
Back in 1956, this favorable feature in Japanese movie which is also known as Japan's "monstar" came across the ocean to Hollywood in the U.S., becoming the first Japanese film released in America. In New York alone, it created a record of lasting for 47 weeks on the screens, and broke the ground for a monster movie genre. (Ryfle 52) Of course, Godzilla had accepted some form of transformation for entering into the United States. (Fischoff 2) American moviemakers re-edited the film and added a role of a er, so that the movie can be appreciable for Americans. An American recalls, said: "Most of my childhood and weekend afternoons are spent with Toho movies. They let me know how the world outside the United States is like."
Godzilla’s terrifying image has only lasted for a decade or so. As a movie series, Godzilla movies took in popular topics in Japanese society. The terrible giant became more entertaining. As there was a boom for wrestling in the 50s, in the third Godzilla movie known as King Kong V.S. Godzilla, fight scenes between Japanese version of King Kong and Godzilla integrated imitation of mixed wrestling action.(Rodrik 14) In the movie of tenth anniversary Godzilla was further personalized. Monsters can communicate with other species with body language and for the first time, the theme—protecting the earth (or humans) from other villain monsters—appeared. So far, Godzilla’s villain image seemed to be gone and this situation lasted in the next several series. Godzilla became the just messenger and its personalization trend was further strengthened as the monster even made popular poses after defeating the enemy.
In the Mothra V.S. Godzilla in 1964, Mothra, which s named after “mother”, plays the guardian for human. Whenever other monsters appear, Mothra will fight against them for mankind. (Junzō, Kazuhiro, Ion, Kabushiki 46) The story also praises maternal love as with Mothra there are always two fairies who can summon or communicate with Mothra, and through this communications, Mothra grows. Therefore, they are very important to Mothra. Meanwhile, in some other movies, in front of the counterpart Ultraman, Godzilla is like a wrestling champion. In battles with other monsters that against human race, many interesting plots has been added to please young audience. Though in 1968-1975, a Godzilla movie was released per year, these series of films at that time had an obvious and sustained contraction on the gross.
Not until 1984 did Godzilla come back with The Return of Godzilla which proved to be a great success. (Junzō, Kazuhiro, Ion, Kabushiki 77) 1995 started the second period of creation of Godzilla series. At the 30th anniversary of Godzilla series, Toho Company released Godzilla, miraculously resurrecting this classic monster character on the big screen. In order to catch up with the speed of the development of tremendous high-rise buildings in Tokyo, Godzilla was then designed as 80 meters tall. (Junzō, Kazuhiro, Ion, Kabushiki 51) With the help of advanced movie shooting techniques, Godzilla returned to a mature story setting. In this period Godzilla discarded efforts of personalization in the 1960s and 1970s, but rather, took a closer standing to the original role of Godzilla, setting it as a spoiler. In this sense, Godzilla became an unpredictable moving natural disaster that made proud citizens feel an overwhelming sense of powerlessness. Plus the re-design of a slightly blunt and dignified appearance, the description of Godzilla tended to be a unique huge creature that has unique personal habit. For example, 1984 version of Godzilla could resonate with migratory birds with ultra-low resonance. These much more down-to-earth description of Godzilla got acclaimed among the audience. During this period Godzilla swallowed nuclear radiation as food and therefore it attacks submarines and nuclear power plants for food, but it also lead to its death because of the uncontrolled abnormal fusion reaction within his body. It is clearly an implication on human civilization.
The year of 1998 launched the first American adaptation of Godzilla. (Junzō, Kazuhiro, Ion, Kabushiki 77) In fact, the American film company TriStar Pictures has gained the right to reproduce from Toho Company as early as 1992. However, went through twists and turns in the process and disagreement, the movie had not come out before 1998. This version of Godzilla did not keep the original style in the seriousness and the sense darkness. (Fischoff 4) Overall it was more regarded as a popcorn movie. In a relaxing movie point of view, the way this movie combines plot and entertainment is good, but in a light of a Godzilla movie, the subject is not suitable for this relaxed style. The setting of Godzilla was a failure as it described Godzilla as a lizard exposed to radiation mutated, losing the original taste of Godzilla movie and gained a notorious name of being a "military video”. The concept of Godzilla should be more a curse, a symbol of punishment from God, but in the 1998 version, it is no more than a poor mother lizard.
Entering another millennium, Godzillas born is this period inherited the classic image of the 80s and 90s in a certain degree, but compared with the previous period, it gives more emphasis on the very beginning features, which makes the current image of Godzilla more complex and with different symbolism: the punishing curse of human civilization, the victim, or a soul irritated by over-advanced (or unnatural) technology.
Born in America, unfortunately, in a sense, the vigor of Godzilla is also tempered by the Hollywood effect. Its shooting technique wins audiences’ heart and reduces other SF movies’ space of existing. At this moment Japanese Godzilla shooting can be said to have temporarily come to an end. ( Fischoff 4)
III.Underlying factors behind Godzilla
As is mentioned Godzilla’s existence has close link with America and Japan’s relationship.
Firstly, Godzilla's existence serves as a portrayal of the Japanese postwar social atmosphere. Its name, the combination of these two animals, is not a coincident. Respectively, it reveals attitude of Japanese toward technology and natural, especially due to their special geopolitical location which could be affected by any subtle changes.
Godzilla in different movies have different political symbolism, but their meanings often change with the times, especially with the turbulence along Japan-US relations. American’s resentment in Japan for Attack on Pearl Harbor from the beginning slowly came to accepting the U.S. role as a partner and ally. (Biondi 21) In movies and television works in the United States were also growing recognition for Godzilla which used to represent the U.S. (Biondi 21) In 1964, China’s successful test of an atomic bomb aroused Japan’s attention, the old rivals to become the Japanese new threats of imagine. Therefore, in Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster, the Chinese appeared as an imaginary enemy. In this film released by the end of 1964, where Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra, Ghidorah fight against each other, Godzilla is the representative of the United States, representatives of the Russian Rodan, Mothra a mother-like existence as well as the patron saint of human, which in fact is the representative of Japan, and the most ferocious representatives Ghidorah the rising China. When Japan (Mothra) faced Ghidorah’s threat, Godzilla and Rodan are wrestling together, which is in fact suggesting the Cold War, and later. They two join Mothra to battle Ghidorah and finally defeated Ghidorah. However, Godzilla represents not only the United States. (Biondi 22) Sometimes it is also on behalf of Japan, because the Japanese audience has begun to identify with this monster. This thinking is best exemplified by King Kong VS Godzilla where Godzilla fights against a Japanese gorilla. For the U.S. version and the Japanese one, there were two different endings which give a win for each side. At the end, both people are happy.
The Hollywood films holding vigilant attitude towards the prevalence of science and technology. For the Japanese, they do not fear technology, but nature-the nature out of control. In a sense, nuclear weapon is a form of lost control on the power of nature. At the end, however huge and scaring this monsters are, they always reflection the fragileness of ambitious human being and their relationship with this world, their political point of views, and their need for an exploration in the world of fiction.
Reference Page
史歌.《哥斯拉》中的经典符号, 15 Jul. 2017.
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Biondi, Robert. A Critical Comparison between the Japanese and American Versions of the Godzilla Films, G-FAN Issue. 10 July/August 1994
Fischoff, Stuart, et al. "The Psychological Appeal of Movie Monsters." Journal of Media Psychology 10.3 (2017).
Poole, W. Scott. Monsters in America: Our Historical Obsession with the Hideous and the Haunting. Baylor University Press, 2017.
Rodrik, Dani. King Kong Meets Godzilla: The World Bank and the East Asian Miracle. No. 944. CEPR Discussion Papers, 1994.
Ryfle, Steve. Japan's Favorite Mon-star: The Unauthorized Biography of" The Big G". ECW Press, 1998.
Tsutsui, William. Godzilla on my mind: Fifty years of the king of monsters. Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.
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