EVERYONE knows Raymond Burr as the television detective Chief Robert T. Ironside. Although confined to a wheelchair after he was wounded by a sniper, Chief Ironside nevertheless continues to battle crime as a "special consultant" to the San Francisco Police Department. Along with three sidekicks - two guys and a gal - he investigates crimes as varied as finding why long-odds horses are winning races to rooting out a police captain who planted evidence - but who was also one of his best friends.

Of course, those of venerable summers will remember Raymond - who was born in Canada - as starring in Perry Mason the series that pretty much defined the lawyer television program. Whether Perry ever lost a case or not is a matter more of definition than of jurisprudential outcome.¹

But it is the Cognoscenti of Cinema who remember Raymond playing the part of newspaper reporter Steve Martin in the 1956 film Godzilla, King of the Monsters. This was the first of the many - and we must admit it - highly popular Godzilla movies that show no sign of abeyance.

Of course, the CONSUMMATE Cognoscenti of Cinema also know Godzilla, King of the Monsters was an Americanized version of a Japanese film released two years earlier titled ゴジラ or as it appeared in the poster (spelled top to bottom) . Best translated as Godzilla it is sometimes advertised in English as Godzilla 1954.

The movie was one of the biggest hits in Japan. As often happens with popular movies, the critics looked down their collective noses at a movie where the main character was a gigantic fire breathing lizard who spends most of his time stomping around Tokyo. Later - again as often happens for movies that launch sequels that pull in the crowds - critical opinion moderated to where it wasn't so bad after all.

The American version was produced by Joseph Levine and the scenes with Raymond were shot and then spliced into the original movie where English was dubbed over the Japanese. So it looked like Raymond was talking with the original actors.

Naturally the dubbing allowed the dialog to be altered and plot changes slipped in. The original film had a decidedly anti-war and anti-nuclear message. Not only were the memories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki still fresh in the minds of the Japanese but several months before the movie was released a crew on a Japanese fishing boat had been sickened by fallout from nuclear tests being conducted by the United States. The political message was toned down a bit for the American audiences although the film kept the plot point that it was the hydrogen bomb testings that brought Godzilla up from the deeps.

Perhaps the biggest surprise was that when the Americanized Godzilla King of the Monsters was released in Japan (with Raymond's dialog dubbed into Japanese), the audience rather liked it. After all the story of the original was more or less kept in place including a love triangle involving the Emiko (the comely daughter of Dr. Yamane), Captain Hideo Ogata, and Dr. Daisuke Serizawa. Also the running time was reduced a bit to a moderate 80 minutes which sped things up a bit.

But what all true scholars want to know is how to pronounced "Godzilla" in proper Japanese. Unfortunately the explanations can be a bit confusing to the non-native speaker.

Usually a direct transliteration of the Japanese title ゴジラ is Gojira. And in some cases you will read (and hear) the pronunciation is sort of like go-JEE-ruh. Other times it will be rendered something like go-DZIL-uh and still others as GODE-jee-lah.

Differences in pronunciation are expected. We not only read that Japanese has formal and informal pronunciations but as in all languages there are regional variations. Of course, nowadays some of the "official" pronunciations you find are obviously computer generated with only slightly more clarity than the speaking of a 1930's science fiction movie robot.

The simplest way to find the correct speech would seem to be just to view the original Godzilla from 1954. This is available today either as a streaming video or on the sadly disappearing and increasingly forgotten digital video disc (DVD). Some videos even have both the original Japanese film (with subtitles) and the Americanized version with Raymond. So you could hear the name spoken by native speakers in normal conversation.

There are many places in the original movie where the actors pronounce the name (the subtitles help). And a strange thing happens. Depending on what you expect to hear - whether it's god-ZIL-la, go-DZEE-loh, or even go-JI-ra - that's pretty much the way the word comes out.

Helping resolving this conundrum is that a letter in an alphabet isn't necessarily the same letter - or rather a single letter can represent different sounds. For instance, a D in English is not pronounced the same as in Spanish. The O in English is clearly distinct to non-native speakers from the same letter in French.

And the letters of interest here - D, Z, J, I, L, and R - are among the most variable in enunciation even within English.

What happens is the letters can change in sound depending on what the preceding and following letters are. A common claim made by English speakers is that native speakers of Asian languages keep intermixing the R's and L's. Actually that's not quite correct.

Yes, in English - American English - the letters are distinct. The R is what linguists call an alveolar or retroflex approximant. This means the tongue doesn't touch the roof of the mouth but the tip is raised to produce the "ur" or "er" sound that to non-English speakers makes the language sound like cats fighting. Although R in American English is called a consonant it does not actually stop the flow of air and sometimes is called a "semi-consonant".

L on the other hand is a voiced alveolar liquid consonant. That means the tongue touches the roof of the mouth just behind the teeth - on the alveolar ridge - and the air passes out through either side of the tongue while you vibrate your vocal cords. This is what you get if you say LEE. However if you say LAH, the L is a voiced DENTAL liquid consonant which means the tongue touches the the back of the teeth. So we see although there's only one L written there's more than one L

Now you will see some Japanese words transcribed using L's such as the girl's name リナ represented as Lina (which means Small Flower). However, in proper official linguistic transcriptions this will be written as Ri-na with an R. So officially Japanese does not have an L sound. But in some words and to some English listening ears it nevertheless sounds like it does.

The resolution of this conundrum is that in English the letter R has the most variability even among English speakers and in certain dialects it can come out close to an L. Although in "standard" American English the R is the alveolar or retroflex approximant in other English dialects it can be a voiced alveolar tap. There the R is produced by tapping the tongue against the alveolar ridge. This is clear if you listen to some with a Scottish accent say "red rose". Or if they say "Edinburgh" it comes out like "ed-in-BUH-[tongue-tap]uh".

And the Japanese R is similar to the Scottish, but not exactly. If you say a Scottish R and an American L you will note slight differences in the position and articulation of the tongue. The Japanese R we are told is somewhat between the two sounds.

But - an important point - is that the Japanese alphabet does not separate consants from the vowels. So for R you have り for ree, る for roo, れ for reh, ろ for roh. And like saying LEE and LAH, if you say "ree - roo - reh - roh", you'll find subtle differences in how the R is articulated.

So although in some words the Japanese R sounds similar to the Scottish letter but in others it sounds more like the English L. Also there are differences in personal pronunciations. In some cases a native speaker may sound to an American like he is in fact saying "Godzilla". But at other times and when rapidly spoken it may come out as different as go-JI-ra and maybe even gō-DZAHN-ōh.

(To decide for yourself if these rather astonishing statements are correct, click here → .)

For all the snootiness that modern critics might heap upon the original movie, it's actually pretty good. Yes, it's easy to see that the buildings, trains, cars, buses, and boats that Godzilla stomps are miniatures, but the special effects are surprisingly effective. Despite the accolades about modern computer graphical effects, they sometimes can be pretty cheesy. The actors in Godzilla 1954 are also quite capable and there's more to the plot than a big lizard stomping around.

Since Godzilla first trounced Tokyo in Godzilla (1954) and its Americanized variant Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956), the Lofty Lizard has reappeared in Godzilla Raids Again (1955), King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962), Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964), Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964), Invasion of Astro-Monster (1965), Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966), Son of Godzilla (1967), Destroy All Monsters (1968), All Monsters Attack (1969), Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971), Godzilla vs. Gigan (1972), Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973), Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974), Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975), The Return of Godzilla (1984), Godzilla 1985 (1985), Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989), Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991), Godzilla vs. Mothra (1992), Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993), Godzilla vs. Spacegodzilla (1994), Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995), Godzilla (1998), Godzilla 2000: Millennium (1999), Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2000), Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001), Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002), Godzilla: Tokyo SOS (2003), Godzilla Final Wars (2004), Godzilla (2014), Shin Godzilla (2016), Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters (2017), Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle (2018), Godzilla: The Planet Eater (2018), Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019), Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), Godzilla Minus One (2023), and Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire (2024).

As seen in this list Raymond reprised his role in 1985 in the commonsensically titled film Godzilla 1985. The picture was produced and in a manner quite d'accord with the first movie. The Japanese version, The Return of Godzilla, was filmed first with an all-Japanese cast and the next year Raymond's scenes were shot and inserted. According to a scholarly study, Raymond was able to have all his scenes shot in a single day.

However, in all of these depictions there is one great TRUTH that must be stated. In 1998 the high priced Hollywood version of Godzilla with big name stars hit the screens. It did well at the box office but did not fare so well with the critics. There were decided changes in characterization that did not set well with the fans.

So to no one's surprise a year later another Japanese production Godzilla 2000 hit the theaters. And it returned to the basics. The picture fared much better with the critics than the 1998 extravaganza and so proved the one TRUTH that all Godzilla fans have known from the start.

IF IT AIN'T GOT A GUY IN A GODZILLA SUIT IT AIN'T A GODZILLA MOVIE!!!!!

References and Further Reading

Raymond Burr: A Film, Radio, and Television Biography, Ona Hill, McFarland and Company, 1994.

A Critical History and Filmography of Toho's Godzilla Series, David Kalat, McFarland & Company, 1997.

Hiding in Plain Sight: The Secret Life of Raymond Burr, Michael Starr, Applause Theater and Cinema Books, 2008.

"Did Fictional Criminal Defense Lawyer Perry Mason Ever Lose a Case?", Bianca Piazza, Distractify, March 22, 2023.

"How to Say Godzilla in Japan", Anne Jane, How To Say Guide, May 22, 2018.