Atomic Dreams and the Nuclear Nightmare: The Making of Godzilla

by Peter Brothers

For the first time in English print, the complete story of the making of one of the most significant and influential films of the 20th Century. Originally intended to cash-in on the then current trend of American monster movies, what resulted instead was the cinema's first anti-nuclear treatise to reach an international audience. Gathered from previously unpublished sources, rare photographs, personal interviews and with shot-for-shot descriptions of both the Japanese and American versions, "Atomic Dreams and the Nuclear Nightmare" is a tribute to the greatest monster movie of them all.

Genres: Film

532 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 9, 2015

Reviews

[Dave Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author Peter Brothers covers the making of, the precursor to, the critical response, and the international distribution of both the original 1954 film "Godzilla" and the 1956 Americanization "Godzilla: King of the Monsters" in detail. Actually, no, it's really constantly verging on too much detail, with endless parenthetical comments that interrupt the narrative flow and often seem to assume the reader is completely clueless about WWII, 1950's culture, Japan, America, the movie industry, etc. I found that the early pre-film production content was too long, and that while some of the content was excellent - the descriptions of the adventures of the two actors who alternated suffering through being in the Godzilla costume were particularly harrowing - other parts, like the commentary on which instruments predominated in various portions of the film, were overkill.

There's no question that Brothers knows the film and its story inside and out. Whether every single iota of that information needed to be in this book is worth asking, however. Notably, the book also includes extensive notes on what changed for the American version, the original Godzilla story, and a shooting script, great for superfans.

One more note: The book is printed in an 8.5" x 11" format without compensating with wider margins, making it surprisingly difficult to read. The lines are sufficiently long that I found myself restarting that same line rather than naturally advancing to the next line, as happens so effortlessly in a smaller format book. FYI.

[BJ Haun · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have mixed feeling about this. I bought the book after reading the sample from Amazon which had a lot of what I was hoping for in this book: stories from the production of the movie. After the first couple of chapters, however, the book covers stuff other than the production of the movie. A couple of chapters are shot-for-shot descriptions of the movie (one for the original Japanese release, another for the re-cut American version), and another chapter is a collection of newspaper articles about the movie that were released in the Japan at the time (man, you think movie trailers spoil movies nowadays? You should read some of these articles from before the movie was released! Straight up spoiled the ending!).

I found this additional information to swing from somewhat interesting to rather dull. I had hoped for a more focused study of the production of the movie itself, but perhaps a lot of that story is lost to time.

I should also note that roughly half of the Kindle version of the book is Appendixes. These include essays about the film, the original write-up of the plot, descriptions of deleted scenes, and the "shot list" for the movie.

[Ursula Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

All About the 1954 Film

This book was undoubtedly a labor of love for the author and is a fact filled treat for Godzilla fans. As mentioned in the book, I saw the original American version Godzilla, King of the Monsters with Raymond Burr and didn't discover the original Japanese version until I obtained the Criterion edition that contained both copies. The success of the film surprised the filmmakers and Godzilla is still popular today. The American version finally got Big G right with Gareth Edwards Godzilla 2014. King of the Monsters was amazing, seeing the monster verse in IMAX and I look forward to Godzilla vs Kong in 2021. If you enjoyed and loved the original 1954 film, read and savor this book. It covers everything, from the creation, casting and filming, to reviews and the American version. Shot breakdowns, deleted scenes and more are found. A trip down memory lane.

[mabuse cast · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good book about the making of and reception of both cuts of the original "Godzilla" (1954) that while it can go a bit overboard in detail in some spots I still think this is the best book covering only the original Godzilla film out there,in English at least, and I am glad to have a copy that was signed/autographed by the author!

[Rich Meyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting, if a tad overblown, look at the making of the original Godzilla movie, covering both the original Japanese production and the US version with Raymond Burr. The detail the work goes into on the original film is amazing and welcome; I actually learned quite a bit that I hadn't known about the genesis of the character.

As with the author's other book on Japanese fantasy, the e-book has severe formatting issues; it's readable, but many sections may give you a headache. The length of the e-book proper is only about 60% of the file, as there are numerous appendices, some useful (the shot list of both movies) and some pointless (complete credits for the file anyone could get off IMDB).

I can't quite recommend the e-book, but I'm assuming the print book would be easier to read, so if you're a kaiju or Japanese cinema fan, try that one.

[William A Howes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book. Some interesting, unique nuggets of Godzilla lore. The appendices went a little farther than necessary.