Simon Pegg, Cultural Appropriation, and Godzilla

"Thanks, Hollywood!" sez the Hotel Gracery's Godzilla head in April 2015. Photo by Brett Homenick.

If you're reading this, then you're more than likely aware of the recent brouhaha surrounding Simon Pegg and his recent comments regarding Godzilla Minus One (2023), the American-produced MonsterVerse movies, and cultural appropriation. Of course, this isn't a political blog, and it's going to stay that way, but I can't address this topic without reflecting a bit on that particular social issue. However, the thrust of this blog post is a response to certain folks who seemingly know nothing about Japan or Godzilla yet feel compelled to speak on their behalf.

Before we begin, I just have to ask: Should we consider that Toho itself has made King Kong, Frankenstein, and Hammer-inspired vampire movies? Would these be examples of cultural appropriation? If not, why not? Should writer-director Kazuki Omori get publicly chided for introducing elements borrowed from Hollywood blockbusters into the Godzilla series? More to the point, how about that recent Godzilla flick that ripped off Steven Spielberg movies so shamelessly that the director of said flick thought that Spielberg would get angry with him over it? Where's the outrage? Why hasn't anyone called in the Twitter Mob yet?

I lived in Japan for 13 years and in Tokyo proper for 10. During that time, I talked to a lot of Japanese people -- both in and out of the film industry -- and became quite familiar with their way of thinking. I also personally saw the dramatic change that the Godzilla franchise underwent in Japan as it happened in real time in the mid-2010s. But let's circle back to the beginning.

When I first moved to Japan in 2011, Godzilla was nowhere to be found. Unless you knew what collectible shops happened to carry Godzilla items, or you knew which promoters or organizations hosted tokusatsu-themed events for die-hard fans, you were about as likely to find something Godzilla-related in Japan as you are to walk down Hollywood Boulevard today and find a whole bunch of Night Gallery memorabilia. 

But one incident in particular changed all that for good -- the release of Legendary Pictures' Godzilla in 2014. Say what you will about that film -- and I have very little positive to say about it -- but it put Godzilla back on the map as an international property that could draw hundreds of millions of dollars at the worldwide box office and even earn a bit of critical praise along the way. (It also had the added benefit of giving a hungry Bryan Cranston enough scenery to chew to satiate his appetite until his Oscar-nominated performance in Trumbo the following year.)

In the wake of the film's release, Godzilla suddenly became a priority for Toho again -- a new, massive Godzilla mural was painted on the side of a studio wall, the Godzilla head was erected in the terrace of Shinjuku's recently-opened Hotel Gracery, and more Godzilla-related events and exhibitions started to pop up all over the place. Shin Godzilla (2016), a big-budget, homegrown Godzilla outing, was also released. The Godzilla Store opened its doors shortly thereafter. None of this existed, or was even thought possible, before 2014.

The ongoing success of the international franchise ensured that Takashi Yamazaki could make his VFX-laden Godzilla the Ride short film and -- yes, you guessed it -- Godzilla Minus One. If the MonsterVerse films were examples of cultural appropriation, Toho certainly wasn't seeing any downside.

If it isn't clear yet, I should point out that Godzilla as a character and franchise had zero cultural relevance in Japan by the time I'd arrived in the country. (Of course, I'd been hearing the same from others who'd traveled or lived in Japan since at least the early 2000s, but for our purposes I'll stick to what I saw firsthand.) 

TV-oriented tokusatsu franchises like Kamen Rider, Super Sentai, and Ultraman were all the rage with children, and Godzilla simply didn't exist for them. Adults too paid little attention to the King of the Monsters, with only the hardcore otaku types turning out for events or buying any merchandise. Is it even possible to "appropriate" that which is culturally irrelevant?

OK, now I have to ask a fairly obvious question to anyone who is complaining about the alleged cultural appropriation here: Have you talked to a Japanese person? 

Chances are you haven't, but I have, and you might be surprised how they feel. To illustrate this point, let's switch from Godzilla to Japan's other cinematic heavyweight -- Akira Kurosawa. When I was teaching in Japan, one of my students was named Takashi (though he didn't carry a plastic toy with him everywhere he went). He was a businessman fluent in English who also often worked with Japan's national government on a variety of projects. I enjoyed speaking with him and getting his perspective on a myriad of topics. 

In 2019, we were talking about movies, and I decided to show him what the BBC had recently named as the best foreign-language film of all time, thinking he would get a kick out of it or perhaps even feel a bit of pride. When he saw Seven Samurai (1954) listed in the top spot, his reaction was (as close as I can come to an exact quote all these years later), "What?! But they're not even elite samurai!"

Despite what you may think, that's not surprising for a culture in which even Toshiro Mifune, often hailed as Japan's greatest actor (by those outside Japan), is largely forgotten (while Mifune's contemporaries Ken Takakura and Kiyoshi Atsumi still enjoy a modicum of cultural relevance). Maybe Hollywood ought to step in and make a Mifune biopic in order to bring him back to worldwide prominence, but, after reading all this nonsense about the MonsterVerse, I think we know how that would go down.

Western interpretations of Japanese cinema can be a lot of fun to read, and they can add new perspectives to movies that the filmmakers likely never even considered. But it's probably fair to say that Godzilla is still more culturally relevant in America even today than it is in Japan (which was certainly true prior to 2015). If you're relying on Western interpretations by Americans who only know Japan through the movies to explain how the Japanese relate to anything, you're missing some much-needed context.

A day or so before Shin Godzilla came out, I happened to walk past a group of businessmen at a restaurant who were talking (and laughing!) about the film's upcoming release. After it came out, an adolescent student of mine, who enjoyed the film, told me he liked seeing the familiar Tokyo locations in the context of a monster movie. Takashi, whom I mentioned above, also liked Shin but mostly as a criticism of the bureaucratic nature of the national government, which was a topic in which he was particularly interested. These are just a few anecdotes, but you'll note the lack of World War II symbolism. Honestly, I never encountered a single Japanese person who related to Godzilla as anything other than a movie monster. (But that's Western over-analysis of Godzilla '54 for you.)

Overall, I think it's great for people to be influenced by other cultures. Japan has loved Hollywood movies for decades, so good luck trying to get Japanese filmmakers not to be inspired by American movies. I have no idea where the notion that cultures must remain completely separate from each other came from, but let's help it find its way to the nearest circular file where it belongs.

Just to be clear, I'm not "calling out" anyone in particular. While Pegg's MonsterVerse comments were the driving force that motivated me to write this post, it can apply just as easily to anyone who buys up every Criterion release of a Japanese movie and therefore thinks he/she is an expert on all things Japanese. Sometimes it helps to know the things you don't know.