Director Gareth Edwards talks ‘Godzilla,’ the focus on characters, CGI and good vs evil

Gareth Edwards answered a few questions this week at SXSW about Godzilla, a reboot of the franchise featuring an all-star cast for the Monsters director.

“Probably one of the important things I felt about this film was that the characters at the heart of the story shouldn’t be superheroes. They should be everyday relatable people. In the [Steven] Spielberg movies they found that holy grail, the sweet spot of having the epic spectacle, but also relatable and emotional characters. Those events change and affect the characters, but the idea of someone blatantly saving the day becomes quite predictable. The events are real harrowing and present a life-changing scenario, so we just tried to take it really serious,” Edwards tells Variety.

Edwards discusses the CGI era, the floodgates of films since Jurassic Park before talking about the pressure of adapting the famous creature.

“As much pressure as the fans put on you, the studio put on you, nothing equals the amount of pressure I put on myself. You only live once and this is a once in a multiple lifetime opportunity, so I don’t want to screw it up. But you also shouldn’t make a film for other people, you should make something you want to sit and watch that gives you goosebumps.”

Lastly, the director answers the questions if Godzilla is good or evil.

“Neither. He’s restoring the balance to nature. We’ve taken an absurd position on the planet as this alpha predator and the movie suggests, what happens if we weren’t top dog. He comes along and puts us in our place. If you try and pick a fight with nature, you’re going to lose. But the film does take itself very seriously. I could have made a cheesy popcorn version and it probably would have done well, but that’s not what we were looking for.”

Check out the full interview HERE

The film stars Bryan Cranston, Elizabeth Olsen, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Juliette Binoche, Sally Hawkins, Ken Watanabe, and David Strathairn.

Godzilla opens in 2D, 3D, and IMAX 3D on May 16th.