Our first feature, Killer Bees, is a terrible Japanese film about some girls who go camping and get attacked by killer bees. It's a hat trick of tediousness, dullness and boredom. There are 7 girls and a chaperon. They park their van a long way from the camping spot. We have to walk with them as they prattle on and on about things teen Japanese girls like. Then nothing happens for a while, except for that prattling on and on. Eventually a bee shows up to do some stinging. He picks off the girls one by one, putting them into shock which is followed by death. Reminds me not to go into the forest. There's nothing to recommend about the movie. How anyone would enjoy it I can't imagine. Avoid at all costs.
Sadly our second feature, Alakazam The Great, isn't much better. It's the US version, produced by AIP, of a 1960 Japanese animation called Saiyuki. That cartoon is adapted from Osamu Tezuka's manga Boku no Son Goku which adapts of the Chinese novel Journey to the West. The original Toei animation is fairly well done and attractive in places. It vaguely follows the original Chinese story, softening it for children. You can see it at the above link but there are no subtitles. They can be downloaded and attached to the film someway. If you find out how, let me know. The US adaptation looses all connection to the actual Monkey King story changing the names of all the characters into something completely different, Buddha becomes King Amo. I can sort of understand that, no one in the US would have known about that story for the most part and a lot of people wouldn't want their children to be watching a story with Buddha in it. The US version has some good voice talent. Frankie Avalon sings the songs for the Monkey King but MK's talking is voiced by Peter Fernandez. The voice of Disney's Winnie The Pooh, Sterling Holloway, provides the narration. Other famous voices included Jonathan Winters, Arnold Stang, Dodie Stevens, & E.G. Marshall. None of them make the film worth seeing. I'm not sad that I saw it, I'm curious about adaptations of the Monkey King and would have watched it to see what they did. Now I have, I can move along to the next thing. You too, move along, move along, nothing to see here.
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