Godzilla vs. Biollante - The Criterion Collection 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray

After countless smashes of Tokyo, and after numerous encounters with gigantic beasts, the 1980s saw Japan’s most famous resident reborn with The Return of Godzilla (or Godzilla 1985 as it was reedited and retitled in the States). The film was a modest hit, enough so that Toho commissioned a sequel. But how do you follow up the solo rampage of the gigantic lizard? Does he attack Tokyo again, or do they give him a new monster adversary? Obviously, they went the latter route for the wildly entertaining Godzilla vs. Biollante. 

After his latest rampage against Tokyo, Godzilla was driven into the fiery volcano Mt. Mihara. Now, the world is at odds about what to do with the genetically enhanced radioactive cells he left behind. Dr Shiragami (Koji Takahashi) and his daughter aim to help the nation of Saradia use the cells spliced with plants to turn their deserts into an agricultural oasis to free the Saradians of their dependence on oil. But when a terrorist bombing kills Shiragami’s daughter, he uses her DNA to create a new breed of rose so her soul will live forever. Five years later, Japan worries about another attack from Godzilla and what should be done. It’s decided to use Godzilla’s own cells to create a bioweapon that would destroy the monster. Shiragami secretly splices the Godzilla cells into the rose causing it to grow to a massive size. When Godzilla once again breaks free of his volcanic confinement, he will receive a deadly floral reception from the monster Biollante!

Talk about a gas of a Godzilla film! As a moderate fan who has more or less picked through the big guy’s catalog of classic battles, Godzilla vs. Billante is a hoot. The second feature of the Heisei period, this film sees the refreshed and revitalized franchise back in form for big-scale Monster-on-Monster action with plenty of human drama in between. While the human side of the story might get a tad convoluted, director Kazuki Omori wanted to make something of a spy film, this is a hugely satisfying outing. When the action goes big, it’s a parade of scale monster mayhem with impressive practical monster effects. And true to the scale of the production and wanting to go big with these battles, the final form of Biollante had over 30 wires to help the beast battle Godzilla! 

The film’s production is a pretty wild story of its own. After the modest success of The Return of Godzilla (less so the re-edited and very silly Godzilla 1985), Toho was eager to proceed with more films. But to make the sequel special, they held an open contest for the screenplay/storyline of the next feature. The story from a dentist of all people was chosen, providing the foundation for writer/director Omori to work from. Something of a stunt process to drum up publicity, it’s wild to see that it worked out so well for Toho. It’d be amazing to see a major franchise studio like Marvel, DC, or Amazon with their next Bond film hold an open screenplay call for their next major feature - doubt that’d ever happen. 

For one thing, it’s nice to see this film finally get something of a respectable home video release. After getting dumped on VHS back in 1992, it was often smashed into one of those cheap multi-feature DVD and Blu-ray sets from Ecobridge. I think Lionsgate also popped out their own disc eleven or so years ago, but I didn’t check it out since I heard it was just the junky Ecobridge transfer again. So really, this Criterion release has been my first true sit down with this film since the VHS days. While I enjoy most (not all) of the classic Godzilla movies, I loved the weird ones best. The stranger the creature or circumstances, the better. 

Godzilla vs, Biollante was certainly a weird entry and a good one! The film was ahead of its time using genetic research and gene splicing as a backdrop for the story and the rise of the opposing monster. The reason for the accidental creation of the creature lends more weight to the human story as it’s an act of love born out of a great tragedy. On top of that, we have the lingering side plot of the military response from The Return of Godzilla and the little fighter ship Super X2 again failing to be a fully effective Kaiju deterrent. There’s some good human suspense and story working for this film. What I found very clunky is the spies, sabotage, dueling agency, government terrorists plot thread. That’s one piece where the film seems to stub its giant lizardy toe every time it pops up. The different factions, the terrorists, it all just feels like clunky chunky filler rather than an essential plot element. Where and when it counts most, Godzilla vs. Biollante is an intensely entertaining film. 

Vital Disc Stats: The 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray 
Thanks to Criterion, Godzilla vs. Biollante stomps on to 4K with a two-disc 4K UHD + Blu-ray set. Offering spine number 1254, the discs are housed in Criterion’s standard 2-disc cases with a foldout poster that replicates the main menu artwork of Biollante. An essay from Jim Cirronella and cast, credits, and restoration notes are on the other side. The discs load to Criterion’s standard main menu and navigation system.

In a curious case here, the 2160p 1.85:1 transfer of Godzilla vs. Biollante from The Criterion Collection actually comes with an HDR10 grade. All press materials and even the restoration notes and art details fail to mention any kind of HDR grade at all. I’m not sure if this was intentional or an authoring error; I reached out to Criterion a couple of days ago but never heard back so I have to roll with the review as is and assume it was intentional.

Now, as an HDR10 4K presentation of a classic Toho Godzilla film, this is pretty good, but there is a “however” - it’s rather dim. Compared to the included 1080p disc, I think color saturation is overall better, I liked the black levels and shadows a bit more here, it’s just that it runs a tad dimmer on my standard settings. Kicking over to my setup’s “vivid” setting alleviated some of that dimming effect and let those colors pop a little more, but it still just doesn’t quite ring as “correct.” I could be wrong and this is how the master is supposed to appear. It’s certainly very watchable, I didn’t have trouble during my peak daylight hours viewing. In terms of “too dim” 4K releases, it’s nothing on the scale of something like the Universal release of The Black Phone. Again looking over at the 1080p disc, color shades are comparable and whites are a little less hot on the 4K disc, so again I felt that was a bit more appealing. It could just be a bit brighter and we'd hit peak performance. 

Regardless of the HDR grade, the 4K disc offered a notable boost in detail clarity over the 1080p Blu-ray, especially when it gets to the nitty-gritty monster vs monster battles.We can really soak in those details. But even straight human sequences with the litany of characters all looked markedly better in 2160p with a nice healthy bitrate in the 85mbps and beyond range to stand by. Film grain was generally well resolved. It could look a little soupy at times, but I realized those moments usually surround an optical effect or transition of some kind. That “soupy” quality is likely just fallout from the optical process. The few instances of stock footage for the naval battle with Godzilla look a bit rough around the edges, but nothing terrible or distracting since those shots barely last a couple of seconds. I never did pick up the Ecobridge or Lionsgate discs, I never heard good things about them, so I didn’t have access to them to compare for this review. It’ll be interesting to hear from Criterion whether or not the HDR grade was intentional or not, but as is, I’m pretty satisfied even if it’s a curious development. I’m calling this a soft 4/5 if I could do quarter ratings I might go lower to 3.75/5 - but it’s still a solid presentation with a lot to be happy about. Like te great beast Biollante, it grew on me the more I looked with it and sat with it.

On the audio front we have a robust Japanese (with some English tidbits) DTS-HD MA 5.0 audio mix to enjoy. Technically, this is still a 5.1 track, it’s encoded as such, it’s just the LFE channel is quiet. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing as this mix has plenty of activity and impact. Big explosions, the Super X2 battle with Godzilla, Godzilla’s battles with Biollante, and volcanic eruptions all sounded impressive and filled the soundscape nicely. There’s certainly plenty of surround activity to keep those channels rumbling away for these big action sequences. Dialog is generally clean and clear without any issues. Some of the dips into English dialog had rather thick accents but were not indiscernible. My only gripe really stems from the automatic subtitles in Japanese whenever anyone is speaking English or if there is English text on the screen. I imagine that’s a cooked-in feature from Toho’s master, but worth noting all the same. Otherwise I don't have any complaints.

As a whole, we have a nice selection of new and archival extra features to dig through. Podcast host Samm Deighan delivers an interesting commentary track that’s worth the listen. Criterion has also included the 49-minute making-of documentary that goes into an impressive amount of detail about the production and the hardships of creating the creature action. The design featurette may be brief, but it’s really cool to see what Biollante could have looked like, even as a more bipedal opponent. Then we get some deleted effects shots and a collection of multiple trailers and TV spots to poke through. 

4K UHD

• Audio Commentary featuring Samm Deighan

Blu-ray

• Audio Commentary featuring Samm Deighan
• The Making of Godzilla vs. Biollante (HD 49:00)
• Behind the Design (SD 3:01)
• Deleted Special Effects (HD 6:45 Silent)
• TV Spots (HD 1:37 5 Spots)
• Trailers (SD/HD 9:18 7 Trailers)
• The Real Monsters - essay by Jim Cirronella

Godzilla vs. Biollante may have had a tough road to release here in the States (that’s largely due to the Miramax negotiations), with previous discs going OOP and commanding far too hefty a price tag, but now it’s here on 4K from Criterion so screw those discs! One of the weirder and wilder Godzilla adventures, I get a kick out of this one because it really is out there. It’s hitting on gene splicing as a plot when that was a new concept on top of creating a unique new monster for Godzilla to take on - in addition to his usual human adversaries. On 4K the film looks pretty damn good in 2160p. I’m still not 100% sure if the HDR grade is on purpose, we were led to understand it was supposed to be an SDR-only release, but as is it looks impressive. We’ll see if Criterion clarifies or issues a correction. The audio is excellent and really lets the monster mayhem blast away at your sound setup complete with some interesting and informative extra features worth digging into. Recommended.