Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures’ big-budget Godzilla reboot directed by Gareth Edwards (check out our own FamousMonster’s review here) has only been in release for a few days and it has already grossed $93 million in the U.S. and another $103 million worldwide. Critically speaking, the film has also done very well with a 72% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. This Godzilla has defied the odds to become that rarest of cinematic blockbusters in this day and age, the one that will prove to be worth revisiting in years to come.

Next week’s opening of X-Men: Days of Future Past will likely put a dent in Godzilla‘s second weekend earnings, but won’t lessen the cultural impact of the legendary silver screen monster’s first successful U.S. outing. On Sunday it was confirmed that the studios are already developing a sequel to the (pun very much intended) monster smash.

Godzilla
Director: Gareth Edwards
Writers: Max Borenstein (screenplay), Dave Callaham (story)
Cast: Bryan Cranston, Elizabeth Olsen, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ken Watanabe, Juliette Binoche, Sally Hawkins, David Strathairn
Legendary Pictures | Warner Bros.
Rated PG-13 | 123 Minutes
Release Date: May 16, 2013

“We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”

– J. Robert Oppenheimer

In 1954, Ishirō Honda transformed the trauma of war into art with Godzilla, a science fiction film about a gigantic radioactive beast that rises from the depths of Tokyo Bay. The primordial force of nature firebombs Tokyo with its atomic breath, leveling the city and killing thousands. Honda created a walking metaphor for the nuclear devastation of World War II – a fantastic, out of this world creation that could embody the fears of an entire nation.

Godzilla is the granddaddy of kaiju cinema, but it’s also a very poignant and mournful drama – a Japanese film made at a time when the country was still reeling from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as H-bomb testing in the Pacific. Since then, Godzilla has become an international icon of devastation, spawning nearly thirty sequels. The King of Monsters endures because he is the perfect conduit through which to exorcise the predominant fears of our time.

Hey geeks, FamousMonster here! I recently had the opportunity to speak with Max Borenstein, screenwriter of Gareth Edwards‘ upcoming Godzilla film, as well as a graphic novel tie-in, Godzilla: Awakening.

Borenstein wrote, edited, directed, and starred in the 2003 film Swordswallowers and Thin Men while a senior at Yale University. The film starred Peter Cellini, Zoe Kazan, Fran Kranz, and Graham Norris and won Best Feature and Best Screenplay at the New York Independent Film Festival.

What Is Life Worth?, Borenstein’s 2008 screenplay based on Kenneth Feinberg’s memoir, was honored with inclusion on The Black List, an annual list compiled by Hollywood executives of their favorite unproduced screenplays. His 2009 script Jimi, commissioned by Legendary Pictures and based on the life of guitarist Jimi Hendrix, was also included on The Black List.

Borenstein’s script for Legendary Pictures’ Seventh Son, inspired by Joseph Delaney’s young adult dark fantasy novel, The Spook’s Apprentice, is scheduled to be released on February 6, 2015. Godzilla, which comes to theaters on May 16, 2014, will be his first major motion picture screenplay to hit the screen.

A brand new international trailer for Asia has been released for Godzilla, the upcoming remake from Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures. We’ve already seen clips from the upcoming film, including a look at one very loud Kaiju, but this new trailer shows us a lot of new footage with several reveals — I don’t want to spoil it, just take a look for yourself; you won’t be disappointed!!!

Watch the new 90-second trailer here below.

Godzilla, directed by Gareth Edwards, stars Bryan Cranston, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Ken Watanabe, Juliette Binoche, and David Strathairn.

The film hits theaters in North America on May 16, 2014.

In less than three weeks the long-in-the-works Americanized reboot of Godzilla helmed by Gareth Edwards will arise to stomp a new mud hole in the summer box office…hopefully. Since the anticipation for its release has not surpassed our stratosphere (though it’s pretty close), Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures have released an astounding new poster for the scaly blockbuster hopeful’s IMAX 3D theatrical release.

You can check it out here below.