Godzilla
Warner Bros. | Release Date: May 16, 2014 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
62
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 48 Critic Reviews
Positive:
27
Mixed:
20
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyMay 15, 2014
Ironically this big, lumbering movie could have used more, not less. More Godzilla without question, and more emotional content for its very good cast too. Read full review
60
The New York TimesA.O. ScottMay 15, 2014
It is at once bloated and efficient, executed with tremendous discipline and intelligence and conceived with not too much of either. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzMay 14, 2014
How many times have we complained that summer blockbusters are all about the action, at the expense of niceties like character development? Well, Edwards has gone in another direction, one that's more intriguing in theory than on the screen. Read full review
60
EmpireIan FreerMay 11, 2014
Edwards’ film boasts great filmmaking, noble intentions and cracking monster action. Yet it never reconciles its B-movie origins — preposterous premise, clichéd characters — with its solemn, Nolanised tone. This Godzilla stomps but very rarely romps. Read full review
60
Time OutTom HuddlestonMay 11, 2014
It’s always fun to watch scaly, skyscraper-size behemoths lay waste to civilization, but a bit more human drama wouldn’t have gone amiss. Read full review
60
Film.comJames RocchiMay 10, 2014
The best thing about this new Godzilla is that it spares no expense or effort to deliver big, burly IMAX-ified action... The worst thing about this new Godzilla is how that’s the best thing about it. Read full review
58
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerMay 16, 2014
Sometimes, oftentimes, trailers showcase only the good stuff. The actual movie is a pale substitute. Such is the case here. Read full review
58
The PlaylistRodrigo PerezMay 11, 2014
Godzilla asks you to care about its characters, achieves that aspiration, earns your trust, and then not only pivots towards a far less interesting character, but abandons most of its absorbing emotional legwork for a fairly rote and straightforward rock ‘em, sock ‘em monster movie. Read full review
55
TheWrapAlonso DuraldeMay 11, 2014
Director Gareth Edwards (“Monsters”) gets the money shots right, but neither he nor screenwriter Max Borenstein (working from a story by David Callaham) makes the human characters interesting enough to get us through two mostly Godzilla-free acts. Read full review
50
The New YorkerAnthony LaneMay 19, 2014
Skip Godzilla the movie. Watch the trailer. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Geoff PevereMay 15, 2014
Godzilla – both the movie and the big guy – is otherwise something of a lumpy, lumbering great beast of a thing, lurching from city to city, continent to continent, smackdown to smackdown and plot point to plot point with singularly graceless indifference to anything other than those take-home jaw-dropper shots. Read full review
50
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternMay 15, 2014
When the film finally gets around to monsters on a rampage, you'll get both more and less than you bargained for. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinMay 15, 2014
The problem is that he — unlike most modern sci-fi directors, who throw so much CGI at you that they make miracles cheap — seems peculiarly stingy when it’s time to deliver. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMay 15, 2014
What's particularly weird about Godzilla is that for long stretches, all it shows is destruction. Read full review
50
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsMay 15, 2014
The latest Hollywood version of the Godzilla story is neither fun nor fearsome. It’s an empty spectacle in which the humans are as meaningless as the monster. Read full review
50
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallMay 14, 2014
At some juncture — much earlier than director Gareth Edwards intends — Godzilla needs to stop being an extra in his own movie. Read full review
50
Village VoiceStephanie ZacharekMay 14, 2014
Godzilla is one of those generic, omnipresent blockbusters that's undone by the very spectacle it strives to dazzle us with: Everything is so gargantuan, so momentous, that nothing has any weight. Read full review
50
McClatchy-Tribune News ServiceRoger MooreMay 14, 2014
In a tale this timeworn and a film this devoid of humor, with only a few moments of humanity, with tension frittered away by the tedious repetition of the fights, anybody who has ever seen Godzilla in any incarnation can be forgiven for asking the obvious. “What else have you got?” Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierMay 15, 2014
Despite a few fiery breaths, there’s mostly hot air from a lot of serious actors slumming it. Read full review
40
The GuardianPaul MacInnesMay 10, 2014
While many people might want to go to the cinema to see Godzilla, what they get instead is a load of homosapiens desperately trying to put a human face on the drama. Read full review
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