Parents' Guide to Godzilla

This is both thrilling and broodier than you might expect for this kind of a movie. It's exciting because the special effects are fantastic, a far cry from the Godzillas of yore, and because the actors, though underused—especially Cranston—bring a level of authenticity to characters, something we don't often get in this genre. And when we finally do see Godzilla, after a prolonged wait, it's a thrilling moment. In fact, any time Godzilla makes an appearance on-screen, it's interesting.

Unfortunately, there's not enough Godzilla in this movie and too many otherworldly creatures, specifically the M.U.T.O.s (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms). Godzilla fights them, as do the humans, but they feel more like a distraction. And the dialogue is clunky in places, prone to overexplanation. (A sample line, told with a straight face: "It's not the end of the world," uttered, of course, when the world clearly is ending.) Each scene feels so ominous and overwhelmed by Alexander Desplat's foreboding score that it's hard to differentiate one moment from the next. But the finish? It's a crowd-pleaser, which just bumps the movie into three-star territory.