Unemployed and hitting the bottle hard Gloria (Anne Hathaway) is struggling in her relationship with Tim (Dan Stevens) who find it increasingly difficult to tolerate her out of control lifestyle, so when he breaks up the relationship Gloria has no choice but to return to her home town which is a far cry from the New York City lifestyle she has become used to.

A chance encounter with her old friend Oscar (Jason Sudeikis) seems to be a lifeline as he is more than welcoming towards her and helps her get back on her feet, even offering her a job at the bar he runs, not exactly the kind of environment for a girl trying to give up a party lifestyle but she embraces the moment and soon becomes welcomed as part of the group of barflies who frequent Oscar’s establishment. One night after another heavy session Gloria wakes up to the news that a giant kaiju has appeared in Seoul, after a couple of repeat drinking sessions and kaiju re-appearances Gloria begins to realise that she may just have some form of link with this giant monster, so after some further testing of her theory she realises that the kaiju will appear at certain times during the day and mimics her actions precisely as long as she is located in a certain point in town.

 

If this sounds a little bizarre, I can’t argue with your statement, but what director Nacho Vigalondo has created is a clever story which investigates the bizarreness without every taking the plot too much into the farcical field. Both Hathaway & Sudeikis play off each other superbly, making a believable friendship which gives the situation a realistic feel of two people just trying to make the most of what life has thrown them, who are cast into the middle of this zany situation.

 

Despite all the comedy and laughs the movie does not back away from dealing with the darker issues at hand with alcoholism, self loathing, relationship control or external cries for help all featuring heavily and what looks like it could be a straight up comedy injects some real moments where we question which is the real monster and whether the kaiju is just a large scale projection of Gloria, albeit on the other side of the world, who has the potential to wreak havoc with one wrong step.

There are issues with the balance of the film and some of the character changes are stretched to the limits, but it’s all brought together nicely when the movie finally does come full circle. Although the last fifteen minutes were a little too far fetched for me, I was pleasantly surprised just how entertained I was overall. This is definitely going to be one of the most unique films you’ll see this year.

DJ Speaks Movies Rating: 6 Out Of 10

©Darren Jones 2017