Godzilla Minus Zero Opens 6 November, and Its Director Says a Third Film Is a Coin Toss
Takashi Yamazaki's Godzilla Minus Zero opens in cinemas on 6 November, and the writer-director says he is only about even odds on making a third Godzilla film. Yamazaki wrote and directed the sequel to Godzilla Minus One, and he also served as its visual effects supervisor. He described the chance of a third film as about fifty-fifty, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The new film is set in 1949, two years after the events of the first. It follows the Shikishima family as they face King Ghidorah, another monster from the Godzilla series. The film also includes scenes of nuclear ruin, the South China Morning Post reported.
Minus One came out in 2023. It went on to win the Academy Award for best visual effects, and Yamazaki became the first director to win in that category since Stanley Kubrick. It also became the highest-grossing Japanese live-action film ever released in the United States, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Minus Zero carries another first. It is the first Japanese motion picture filmed for IMAX, the large-format system that uses very big screens and high-resolution cameras. Yamazaki told The Hollywood Reporter that he would be sad if this film turned out to be his last Godzilla, but that he is happy with how the current story ends.
Yamazaki said Hollywood producers and well-known names had approached him with projects after the first film's success. He felt he needed to make Minus Zero before taking any of them on. TIME published an interview with him on 3 November about the new film.
Yamazaki's next project will be in English. J.J. Abrams is producing Grandgear, a mecha film, which is a story built around giant machines piloted by people. Yamazaki is writing and directing it, as reported by The Hollywood Reporter.
The film also has an unexpected cast member. Jordan Vogt-Roberts, the director of Kong: Skull Island, appears as an actor in Minus Zero.
For fans, the most useful date is 6 November, when the film opens. Yamazaki's comments on a third film are not a confirmation of one, and no studio announcement has been reported. The next step is simply to see how the new film performs when it reaches audiences.
