Five lesser-known Godzilla films to watch before the king of monsters turns 70

apan’s greatest monster, Godzilla, turns 70 on November 3 2024, the anniversary of the first movie to feature the character. Godzilla (1954) was a stark exercise in processing the trauma of the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings, but its success inspired the longest-running film franchise in history, with 37 sequels. The many Godzilla movies made by Toho, one of Japan’s biggest film studios, reflect the country’s complex history as victims of the only nuclear bombings and as a rapidly developing economy in the 20th century. The two most recent live-action films, Shin Godzilla (2016) and Godzilla Minus One (2023), updated these themes for this century. They respectively criticised the response to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami and Fukushima meltdown. The films nostalgically captured a resurgent Japanese nationalism. Of all 38 movies, I believe these five are the best lesser-known Godzilla films to watch for a mega-monster-marathon. 1. King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962) Godzilla first met his American counterpoint, King Kong, long before their recent showdowns in the two American Godzilla vs. Kong movies. King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962) began life as King Kong vs. Frankenstein. The brainchild of American special effects luminary Willis O’Brien, it found its way to Japan when Hollywood studios passed on it. In changing Frankenstein to Godzilla, the film became a criticism of the 1960 security treaty between the US and Japan. But it developed into a scathing criticism of rampant consumerism in modernising Japan, focusing on a big pharmaceutical company’s effort to exploit Kong for ratings.