This is a movie I really, really tried to like. It had a good cast, and a great concept that I bought into…but I couldn’t invest myself in it as much as I wanted to. As I watched it, I thought that there was something missing in the movie, like there was a scene that would have tied the story together.

One of the reasons why I try to watch movies in the theater first before they hit the stores is because in the period in between theater and store shelf, they can be cut to make room for other things, or because someone in the studio wanted to monkey around with it before it was packaged up and sent out to eager fingers.

A perfect example of this is Star Trek: Generations. In the scene with Kirk on the bridge of the Enterprise whatever-letter-was-left, he was told that the helmsman (or helmswoman) was Sulu’s daughter. Kirk was surprised by this, asking Scotty how Sulu could find the time to have a daughter.

“He made the time.” was his response.

This small exchange, about thirty seconds, is the whole plot of the movie in a nutshell. When Kirk disappeared into The Nexus and is given his perfect life – he’s not captaining a ship with his hair on fire. He’s having a quiet time in a cabin in Montana (I guess, it’s definitely the Northern Midwest) with someone because when Picard finds him, he’s making breakfast. He’s having the life he sacrificed for Starfleet. This makes his choice to come back to the real world, and sacrifice his life that much more powerful.

That exchange was cut in the VCR release. I remembered that scene in the theater. I even rewound the movie back a couple of seconds (flirting with a hungry VCR. This younger generation will never know the panic) to make sure I hadn’t just checked out mentally for a minute. Nope, it was gone. Someone watching the VCR version would think that Kirk just sacrificed a sweet cabin and some hot Orion girl tail for one last hurrah. No one outside of that initial viewing in the cinema would know that Kirk gave up his perfect, endless life to save some strangers. Again.

That’s how I felt with Colossal. There was a scene, a bit of dialogue or something that would have tied everything together and have it make sense, but it wasn’t in the release I bought (I never got to see it in the theater. I am such a procrastinator). Well, as much sense as a kaiju/romance/chick flick could make. The performances were great – Jason Sudeikis and Anne Hathaway have good chemistry together, and the low-end effects pay homage to the old and honored Godzilla films from Toei Studios. I just wish the story had been a little more coherent for me.

It’s not a bad film. It might benefit from repeat viewings to wear away the novelty and allow a deeper look, but on first blush – it’s not the big must-see I thought it was.