Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris (1999)

The final entry in the Heisei era Gamera trilogy is the best of the lot. Of course there’s kaijū fights, but even better is the story. It explores, from the perspective of one orphaned girl, what it means to have been in the thick of the action during GOTU (1995) and watched everything you love be destroyed: the cold and callous name for which is collateral damage.
The visible enemy resembles something from a JRPG. There’s tentacles that admittedly would be more challenging (however not impossible) to do without CGI, but I wish they’d been less liberal with it elsewhere, because it's the only stain on an otherwise astonishing display of super-detailed models and guys in rubber suits being awesome.

4 steps toward extinction out of 5

Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995)

Gamera's ninth outing is the first of three in the Heisei era reboot. It's a kaijū movie that builds tension in the usual way by having a small group of humans tracking the destruction left by the beast(s) before the eventual reveal. The beasts are familiar giant, carnivorous, featherless birds.
There’s an ecological message beneath the chaos, but it’s the destruction of model cities that most people want to see and it doesn't disappoint.
Gamera (the creature) is awesome. He looks like a fat, stumpy turd on radar but when he surfaces he’s towering and menacing with none of the bad comedic decisions that were forced upon him in some of the previous films.

3½ shadows of evil out of 5

Fist of Legend (1994)

Good guy Gordon Chan remade Bruce Lee’s Fist of Fury (1972), and through careful writing managed to surpass the original in many ways.
Jet Li took on the Chen Zhen role, making the character less two-dimensional, less consumed with rage, and much more emotionally aware of the consequences of his actions. Jet’s wireless martial arts ability flourished under Yuen Woo Ping’s instruction making the action scenes equally as legendary as Bruce’s own, and a hell of a lot more violent.
The film earns a place on the list of remakes that don’t suck.

4½ invading ants out of 5