Zack Handlen

So the other night, I was watching “Godzilla.” No, not one of the Japanese ones, the American one. From the guys who made “Independence Day” and other related popcorn piffle.

Yes, I realize the movie isn’t too brilliant, and considering I had already seen it in the theaters when it first came out, I was more than forewarned.

However, my father had not seen it, and since he’ll watch anything with decent special effects and/or lots of action, I figured this one would be right up his alley.

This was all well and good, and my dad thoroughly enjoyed the film. Problems started however when I sat down to watch it with him. Like I mentioned, I saw it when it first came out, and the way I remembered it, it had not been all that bad. Stupid maybe, but the monster looked big, and he stepped on a few people, and really what more is there to want in a film with a giant lizard? “Rashomon” this ain’t, people. So, I decided to watch some of it along with my parents.

Big mistake. The film starts promisingly - lots of grainy footage of nuclear testing, and occasionally shots of a normal-sized Gila Monster let you know what you’re in for. Matthew Broderick’s character shows up and at first, he’s all right. I later determined this was because he doesn’t speak much at first. He just walks around being impressed. (That’s the main reason Keanu Reeves didn’t destroy “The Matrix.”)

I kept watching and found that my memory had betrayed me. This is a bad movie, and not in a fun kind of way. For every bit of pleasure, there are a thousand pieces of annoying filler, also Broderick (along with most of the rest of the supporting cast) gets more and more irritating as the film progresses.

I decided halfway through that this would be a much better movie if Godzilla would munch on Broderick and his soon to be girlfriend (or ex-girlfriend, or runaway fiancée - it’s all much too complicated and stupid to explain here) when they were having a tender moment. No such luck.

The only saving grace of the film was Hank Azaria, a much underused character actor who does approximately 90 different voices on “The Simpsons.” He wasn’t given much in the way of decent dialogue, but at least I didn’t hate him and was actually rooting for him to survive the film with his sanity and career intact.

It got me to thinking, though. I’d rented a movie for myself that night, “The House on Haunted Hill (HHH),” and while this was also not the world’s best, it was fun, and a heckuvalot more enjoyable than “Godzilla.” Why is this? What makes a B-movie like “Godzilla” so irksome to watch, but a B-movie like “Haunted Hill” such a blast? Besides craftsmanship and talent, I mean.

The answer was fairly obvious, and it’s something that’s been sticking in my craw (if you can believe it) for quite some time now. Rank sentimentality. “Godzilla” has it in spades; “HHH” pretty much chucks it out the window without so much as a look. There are certain scenes in the big “G” that are “character scenes;” i.e., the scenes without the lizard, where we see one of our hapless bunch of complete and total idiots go about defining who they are to the viewers at home. (These people are so dumb, in fact, that Broderick’s character, a guy who studies radiation in worms for god’s sake, makes nearly every major discovery in the film. He leads the army, even.) This is, of course, suppose to make us care for them and fear for their health when danger arises.

I got news. The more character bits we got, the more I wanted to see some serious squishing. That’s what wrecked it for me, really; the constant heaping of forced, clichéd tripe that was used to somehow hide the fact that the only reason we want to see this movie was the giant lizard. No, in “Godzilla,” we get a plot involving a girl who steals from her boyfriend to get a break, only to later repent and, well, I fell asleep at that point. “HHH” on the other hand, doesn’t really worry about it. The set-up: a married couple (played by a wickedly evil Famke Jassen and Geoffery Rush with a superb American accent) invite five strangers to the House, a former insane asylum where everyone was killed in a fire about 30 years ago. Anyone who makes it through the night gets a million dollars. After they’re all inside, the walls fall down. Then people start dying in the most unpleasant ways.

And that’s it. Sure, there are character bits: we know that Rush and Jassen want each other dead. Taye Diggs (our hero) is a former athlete. Chris Kataan is the caretaker who keeps screaming that the house is going to kill everyone. But none of this is done too extreme, and none of it takes away attention from the really fun stuff - all the creepiness the house (and the people in it) can stir up. No false sentimentality. No cheesy “moments.” Simply ghosts and unpleasant murders and things going bump when they really shouldn’t.

The moral? If you want to make a fun thriller, make one. If you’re going to make a drama, go there. But unless you’re blessed with a talented scriptwriter and/or director, don’t try to combine the two. I personally, don’t need a plethora of interesting people in my B-horror/sci-fi movies. Just a cool monster and some cheap thrills.