The film stars Akira Takarada, Momoko Kōchi, Akihiko Hirata, and Takashi Shimura, with Haruo Nakajima and Katsumi Tezuka as Godzilla.

Godzilla pioneered a form of special effects called suitmation in which a stunt performer wearing a suit interacts with miniature sets.

It was met with mixed reviews upon release but was a box-office success, winning the Japanese Movie Association Award for Best Special Effects.

Dismayed that there is no plan to study Godzilla for its resistance to radiation, Yamane returns home, where Emiko and Ogata await, hoping to get his consent for them to wed.

"[24] Terrence Rafferty from The New York Times said Godzilla was "an obvious gigantic, unsubtle, grimly purposeful metaphor for the atomic bomb" and felt the film was "extraordinarily solemn, full of earnest discussions".

He rears up out of the sea as a creature of no particular belief system, apart from even the most elastic version of evolution and taxonomy, a reptilian id that lives inside the deepest recesses of the collective unconscious that cannot be reasoned with, a merciless undertaker who broaches no deals."

Its roster of frightening images—cities in flames, overstuffed hospitals, irradiated children—would have been all too familiar to cinema-goers for whom memories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were still less than a decade old, while its script posed deliberately inflammatory questions about the balance of postwar power and the development of nuclear energy."

[39] During his flight, Tanaka wrote an outline with the working title The Giant Monster from 20,000 Miles Beneath the Sea (海底二万哩から来た大怪獣, Kaitei Niman Mairu kara kita Daikaijū) and pitched it to executive producer Iwao Mori.

[42] Several other directors passed on the project, feeling the idea was "stupid," but Honda accepted the assignment because of his interest in science and "unusual things" and stated, "I had no problem taking it seriously.

Only 50 pages long and written in 11 days, Kayama's treatment depicted Dr. Yamane wearing dark shades, a cape, and living in a European-style house from which he emerged only at night.

On writing the script, Murata stated, "Director Honda and I...racked our brains to make Mr. Kayama's original treatment into a full, working vision."

[46] Honda toned down much of Kayama's political criticism, especially the opening because he felt it was inappropriate to use the Daigo Fukuryū Maru incident and wanted to depict Godzilla as an invisible fear.

[49] Coats of molten rubber were additionally applied, followed by carved indentations and strips of latex glued onto the surface of the suit to create Godzilla's scaly hide.

For close-ups, Toshimitsu created a smaller-scale, mechanical, hand-operated puppet that sprayed streams of mist from its mouth to act as Godzilla's atomic breath.

[49] This first version of the suit was cut into two and used for scenes requiring only partial shots of Godzilla or close-ups, with the lower half fitted with rope suspenders for Nakajima to wear.

[55] Tezuka filmed scenes in the Godzilla suit, but his older body made him unable to fully commit to the physical demands required by the role.

[58] In a 1998 BBC documentary on Godzilla, Kimi Honda, the widow of the director, dismissed the employee-name story as a tall tale and stated that she believed that Honda, Tanaka, and Tsuburaya gave "considerable thought" to the name of the monster: "the backstage boys at Toho loved to joke around with tall stories, but I don't believe that one.

[61] Tsuburaya originally wanted to use stop motion for the film's special effects but realized that it would have taken seven years to complete based on the current staff and infrastructure at Toho.

[62] Settling on suitmation and miniature effects, Tsuburaya and his crew scouted the locations that Godzilla was to destroy and was nearly arrested after a security guard overheard their plans for destruction but were released after they showed the police their Toho business cards.

[73] The filmmakers had little co-operation from the JSDF and had to rely on World War II stock footage, provided by the Japanese military, for certain scenes.

Ifukube borrowed a double bass from the Japan Art University's music department and created Godzilla's roar by loosening the strings and rubbing them with a leather glove.

The optical recording equipment contained four audio tracks: one for principal dialogue, one for background chatter, ambient noises, tanks, planes, and one for the roars and footsteps.

While Ifukube conducted the NHK Philharmonic orchestra, foley artists watched Godzilla's rampage projected on a screen and used tin, concrete debris, wood, and other equipment to simulate sounds that would sync with the footage.

In an attempt to build mystery, Mori banned reporters from the set and kept the special effects techniques and other behind-the-scenes crafts secret.

That version removes the Japanese Diet argument, the acknowledgment of Godzilla as a "child of the H-bomb," references to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and an altered translation of the mother holding her children.

[91] In 2008, images surfaced online of posters for an alleged unofficial Filipino remake of the film titled Tokyo 1960; purportedly directed by Teodorico C. Santos and starring Tessie Quintana and Eddie del Mar.

[95] Since the release of the film, Toho has adopted the epithet "King of the Monsters" for Godzilla, which has since appeared in official marketing, advertisement, and promotional materials.

The 4K remaster, which uses two dupe negatives made in the 1970s and a fine-grain positive print (the best remaining elements), was downscaled to 2K for broadcast[99] and released on 4K Blu-ray in October 2023.

The DVD also includes a documentary about the Daigo Fukuryū Maru, a Japanese fishing boat that was caught in an American nuclear blast and partially inspired the creation of the film.

He found the narrative to be "dull", and criticized Honda for failing to write compelling characters and to withhold the viewers attention for the entire experience.