From the writer that brought you The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile comes…a Godzilla movie! That’s right, renowned scribe Frank Darabont is currently rewriting a script for Godzilla, set for release in 2014. While he’s best known for his outstanding dramas, Darabont has lots of nerd cred from his work on The Walking Dead, The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones, and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3. In a roundtable interview with iO9, Darabont spoke about bringing Godzilla back to his roots as a terrifying force of nature:
What I found very interesting about Godzilla is that he started off definitely as a metaphor for Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And some of the atom bomb testing we were doing in the South Pacific in the subsequent years. The giant terrifying force of nature that comes and stomps the sh*t out of your city, that was Godzilla. Filtered through the very fanciful imaginations of the Japanese perception. And then he became Clifford the Big Red Dog in the subsequent films. He became the mascot of Japan, he became the protector of Japan. Another big ugly monster would show up and he would fight that monster to protect Japan. Which I never really quite understood, the shift.
What we’re trying to do with the new movie is not have it camp, not have it be campy. We’re kind of taking a cool new look at it. But with a lot of tradition in the first film.
While I loved the “Clifford the Big Red Dog” version of the Toho monster as a kid, as I grew up I came to appreciate Godzilla being an allegory for the repercussions of using atomic weapons. I’m intrigued by Darabont’s take on Godzilla. He’s a uniquely skilled writer that can write a compelling monster movie that people will take seriously.
What do you think of Frank Darabont penning Godzilla? Are you interested in his upcoming film? What’s your favorite Godzilla movie of all time?
It has potential. I would’ve loved to see Guillermo del toro take a crack at it since the pacific rim trailer looks so awesome
Del Toro would be an awesome director for the movie, but for a dramatic film, I think Darabont is a better writer.