The Holy Family Defeats the Dragon
Best Film of 2023 Goes to "Godzilla Minus One" (The Barrel Awards)
*Warning: contains some spoilers (although I try to show restrain)
It is rare for me to cry during a movie that has been made in the last few years or to give a film a 10/10. “Godzilla Minus One” has achieved both and is ultimately a very human film about healing from trauma, overcoming shame, and finding redemption in the midst of deep, moral defeat.
The setting of this film takes place in demoralized Japan as Word World II comes to a close. Not only do the Japanese suffer from a humiliating defeat, but they also have been deeply traumatized.
They have trauma from grief. Everyone has lost their family and their homes from the war as well as air raids. For example, 100,000 people died in one air raid alone upon the city of Tokyo. This is the historical context of the film.
They have trauma from shame. Not only did the Japanese suffer great shame from their defeat in the war, but they also had to deal with the sad reality that they were dehumanized by their own government. Many young men were called to become kamikaze pilots who became suicide bombers from the sky. The main character of this film experiences great shame by returning to his nation as a former kamikaze pilot who did not complete his task. He felt that he brought great dishonor upon his nation as well as his own family.
They have trauma from a nuclear holocaust. 78,000 people died instantly when an atomic bomb was dropped upon Hiroshima and countless more died from radiation poisoning, cancers and chronic illness. This was Hell on Earth and a living nightmare for so many.
Why discuss these specific traumas of the Japanese people? Didn’t everyone experience massive loss after World War II? Yes, but historically, Godzilla represents all of Japan’s worst traumas and fears. To defeat him, means to defeat the Enemy of their souls. It means winning their human dignity back and finding hope that they can rebuild their families and nation again.
But the symbolism goes deeper. Godzilla is a dragon of the sea. Keep in mind that in the ancient Hebrew mind, Sheol was a watery place filled with sea serpents and dragons—ancient Leviathan. Many of us modern readers of the Bible actually miss the main point of the Jonah and the whale story. Jonah was not only eaten by a sea beast but was swallowed up by Sheol which became his watery grave. It is in this symbolic context that God rescues Jonah from the jaws of death. In the same way, this film is about being rescued from a dragon of the sea and ultimately, death itself, which had devoured so much of their lives.
Want to learn more about Sheol? Please read this article I wrote in April 2023.
The Holy Family Defeats the Sea Dragon
In this film, fate forms a Holy Family to defeat Godzilla, a dragon rising up out of the sea. A young woman is given a baby by a dying mother. A young man stumbles upon this new mother and doesn’t have the heart to abandon them to an ugly fate. Like Joseph of the New Testament, he considers walking away from this situation, but he cannot. Like Joseph, he is a just and upright man (see Matthew 1:19).
This isn’t the holy family of Jesus, Mary, and Jospeh, but there is an innocence about all three of them. The man and the woman intentionally maintain their chastity throughout the film even though they are unmarried and living together under the same roof within a single room house. (Hollywood has a lot to learn from the success of this film). They are all orphans, and it is the growing love between them that not only aids in their own healing but fuels the defeat of Godzilla. Without this love, the father could not have risen up from the ashes of his shame to face off with this great beast of the sea.
As Christians enjoy this film, we should be able to tap into our own theological imaginations that have been cultivated by our own study of Scripture and experience of liturgy. Symbolic icons and imagery of the Church often depict Christ and His Saints defeating the Dragon who is Satan, the serpent of old. St. Michael throws the Dragon out of heaven (see Revelation 12), and the Saints collectively trample the Dragon underneath their feet (see Romans 16). Christ, the seed of the Woman, ultimately crushes the head of this Dragon although our Lord’s heel is still bitten by him (i.e. his crucifixion; see Genesis 3). Ironically, it is the very suffering of the Messiah from the serpent’s strike that ultimately defeats him once and for all.
The wonderful news of the Gospel (and Godzilla Minus One) is that the Dragon and Death Itself will be defeated one day. We only need to trust Providence to forgive and heal us so that we can rise up from the ashes of our guilt and shame in order to face off against the enemy of our souls so that our families and societies might be saved.
Kyle King
December 28th, 2023
The Holy Innocents, Martyr, Day IV within the Nativity Octave