PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Godzilla Snickers Commercial

 

Sperhauk sent me a link to the new Godzilla Snickers ad. It's pretty silly. Mike sent a 1970's Japanese ad for a vacuum cleaner that's being pitched by Ultraman. I found some weird Korean commercials.

Science Fiction Sunday 205

 

I'm watching the 2 disc 2012 Criterion DVD set of Godzilla today. Instead of just watching the 2 movies I'm listening to the David Kalat commentary on the two movies that come in the set. One is the original 1954 Japanese film and the other is the 1956 US version. The dvd is packed with some nice features. Here is the list from the Criterion site:

• New high-definition digital restoration (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
• New high-definition digital restoration of Godzilla, King of the Monsters, Terry Morse’s 1956 reworking of the original (with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
• Audio commentary for both movies by film historian David Kalat
• New interviews with actors Akira Takarada and Haruo Nakajima and special effects technicians Yoshio Irie and Eizo Kaimai
• Interview with legendary Godzilla score composer Akira Ifukube
• Featurette detailing Godzilla’s photographic effects, introduced by special effects director Koichi Kawakita and special effects photographer Motoyoshi Tomioka
• New interview with Japanese-film critic Tadao Sato
• The Unluckiest Dragon, an illustrated audio essay featuring historian Greg Pflugfelder describing the tragic fate of the fishing vessel Daigo Fukuryu Maru, a real-life event that inspired Godzilla
• Trailers for Godzilla and Godzilla, King of the Monsters
• New English subtitle translation
• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic J. Hoberman.

Kalat's commentaries are rather chatty and personal but they have a lot of information and history on the films. The interviews and featurettes are good. You can learn more about the Lucky Dragon #5 and their encounter with the H-Bomb. The interview with Tadao Sato helps remind us of the importance of the original Godzilla film and the big guy's relevance today. I haven't read the essay yet. For those that like the big guy from Japan, or want to learn more about him, the set is a nice addition to your sf collection. Well worth picking up.

Science Fiction Sunday 187

I'm back to watching all the Toho monster and SF movies that I didn't get to when I was on that Godzilla binge some time ago. I was so drunk on the big G that I forgot when it was. Luckily I have a blog, and a spreadsheet, to keep track of my memory. Now if only I wasn't too lazy to open that file. I have the Classic Media version of Rodan which comes in a two pack with War Of The Gargantuas. They both come with Japanese and US versions. I also have a Video Dakaiju fansub vhs tape that I copied to a DVDR. It looks pretty poor compared to the CM dvd but I'm keeping it for the different translation.

 

Sora no Daikaijū Radon 空の大怪獣 ラドン or Radon, Giant Monster From The Sky came out in December 1956 and it not only introduced a new monster to the kaiju scene but it did it in color for the first time. There's no Godzilla but don't worry the two will tear up some scenery  later. In the US the movie was called Rodan! The Flying Monster when the King Brothers first released it in August of 1957, later it was shortened to Rodan! It was directed by Ishirô Honda who directed some of the better kaiju movies. The special effects are done by Eiji Tsuburaya, a guy who did some of the better Japanese monster film effects. The Japanese version runs about 82 minutes and the US version runs 72-74 minutes.

 

The beginning of the movie has become my favorite part of the film. I enjoy the day to day of the miners going down into the coal mine near their small village. A couple of men get into a fight starting their shift. The fight gets broken up, they get yelled at and sent off to work. Everything goes along well and then there's a call to the office. One of the shafts is flooded and two men are missing. Shigeru, an engineer, goes down the tunnel with a couple of other men. They find one of the men, dead, floating in the black water. First they think it was murder. The dead man was one of the two guys fighting that morning. His opponent is missing and believed to be in the tunnel. They bring the body out and that creates quite the hub bub amongst the villagers. That evening a small monster appears and there's a lot of running around and gun shooting. More of the creatures appear and people are killed. Scientists, press and police all show up. The little critters are identified as some sort of prehistoric bug. Shigeru gets trapped in the mine and finds a giant egg. Rodan pops out and Shigeru escapes but looses his memory. He's found, all confused. Before he can regain his memory, and warn people about the giant monster, Rodan makes his appearance. The city is attacked by Rodan who is joined by a second creature. Both escape but the military find them on Mount Aso. The militay bombs a volcano into existence. The eruption catches one beast and knocks it into the fiery lava. The other tries to escape, but weakened, it gives up and falls into the lava with the first one. The humans watch as the creatures burn, shrieking and twisting in the molten material. The military are all business but the scientists and miners are sort of sad. I understand. It is kind of sad watching them die like that but there is little room for monsters on the earth. Especially people eatin' monsters. Sometimes it's hard being a monster and I can't help rooting for them. I wouldn't like them so much if they were real.

Here are a few tall posters.

   

Here's the trailer.

 

Here are some lobby cards.

 
 

A movie well worth a look, even for those less inclined to watch a monster movie. The earliest batch of Toho movies are some of the better ones but I might be biased. I enjoy it as much as my favorite Godzilla films. I enjoy the production and the characters. It moves along fairly briskly and it's nice and short. 

The Japanese title of The Mysterians is Chikyū Bōeigun 地球防衛軍 or literally Earth Defense Force. It's a 1957 film which Americans saw in 1959. It's directed byIshirô Honda and the special effects are done by Eiji Tsuburaya. While it doesn't have any kaiju monsters in it there's a giant robot which is the handy work of some invading aliens. Those pesky space visitors would become a recurring theme at Toho as they continued to make Science Fiction films over the years. People seem to like 'em. I know I do. That's the Tokyo Shock dvd that came out in 2005. It has a nice print with a Japanese language audio track and a new English audio track. It doesn't have the original US dub version because Toho doesn't own that anymore. I also have a Video DaKaiju VHS tape bootleg that I transfered to DVDR a while back. It doesn't look that great but like Rodan it has different subtitles.

 

The aliens come from the now gone 5th planet in our solar system. One earth scientist calls it Mysteroid. When it was destroyed a long time ago, some of the inhabitents escaped to live on Mars. They are having fertility problems and some of their citizens are born deformed. They need some gals to help build back their race. They aren't satisfied to pick up some local ladies at a bar like any other traveller, no, they want some specific gals and they have already kidnapped three of them. What dicks, huh. That causes a stink. The aliens have a giant robot that they use to trash some buildings and stuff to show how tough their science is. They don't expect their request to be ignored. Sadly they don't get their way. The earth men fight back, over and over, until the enemy is defeated.

 

I find most of the movie entertaining and occasionally kind of exciting. There are a lot of characters and they all have some bit of story. There are explosions and buildings get shredded. The battle scenes in the last half of the movie go on a bit long at times. The costumes and the sets of the invaders are pretty colorful, very manga influenced. The giant Moguera robot is kind of cool in a clunky retro way. The aliens have style, it's just goofy style. I picked up this dvd a little while after it came out and I've watched it a few times. I'm sure I'll watch it a few more times. There's a sequel called Battle In Outer Space which I'll get to in a couple of weeks. I'm going through these chronologically which I haven't done before.

Science Fiction Sunday 164

I'm finally getting to the end of the Godzilla series. I was thinking tackling the rest of the Japanese monster movies after that but I'm taking a break and going back to other genre's of SF movies. Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.is the 27th movie and it was released 12-13-2003. It continues from the previous movie. The government is repairing Kiryu while wondering if there is a reason to continue with the expense. Kiryu is the Mechagodzilla built over the real Godzilla's bones. The Mothra girls come to an old guy they had meet before and tell him to warn the government that they need to chuck the dead Godzilla's bones in the sea. The bones are attracting the big guy will keep coming back for them. Mothra will turn against the human's if they continue on this path. A giant dead sea turtle washes on shore. Looks rather Gamera like. We see the slashes on his next from some giant claws. Ooohhh, huh. The humans are kind of annoying, all noisy, and they don't listen to Mothra. Godzilla does show up and the old man and his grandson call Mothra for some help. It's a nice looking CGI Mothra that show sup. Looks really great. MechaGodzilla shows up and there's more fighting. The huge battle eats up a lot of the movie but is pretty entertaining. MechaG takes over it's own control and grabs Godzilla. They drop into the sea and the movie closes, after some human nattering, with a shot of a secret store of monster DNA. Oh, oh. The movie is more entertaining that the story it tells. The people don't have a lot to do and you've seen it all before. The effects in general are pretty nice and the soundtrack doesn't bother me any. There's a US edition from Columbia TriStar. It's letterboxed, looks pretty good, and has both Japanese audio with English subs and an English Dub version. I don't care for the dubbing very much. I've also got a Video Daikaiju bootleg dvd that is fan subbed that's pretty close to the US version. Worth a gander for the monster fa. The weak story line is bouyed up by the great battle scenes which make it better than average.

The 28th and currently last Godzilla film, Godzilla: Final Wars, came out in 2004. Ryuhei Kitamura is the director. I wouldn't have guessed he'd be directing a Godzilla movie, he does a fairly good job, expecially with the monster action. His script isn't anything special, back to the invading alien theme. Monsters seem to be popping out of the ground all over the world. They are trashing lots of stuff and the earth looks to be in trouble. Some aliens appear, they collect the attacking monsters, saving the earth. It's too good to be true of course and soon enough the aliens are outed. They are inhuman critters, in men suits, out to get their munch on. People are one of the alien's main food groups. Damn, that's some payback for being an animal eater, huh. It's slightly in the future of the rest of the series and it turns out that this Godzilla universe has mutants with special powers. They were rounded up and are now working for the Earth Defense Organization. That will be important in the fight to get rid of the aliens. There's a good bit of action and that was fun enough. I watched the bootleg dvd I had and part of the English Dub I got off of On Demand. There's a US version I hadn't picked up yet. I'm not in a big rush.

Science Fiction Sunday 163

The 25th Godzilla film reboots the series again. Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack pretends the other films hadn't happened and Godzilla returns after 50 years. A nuclear sub goes missing. There's a strange earthquake with a moving epicenter. Other strange things are happening and Yuri, a pretty TV gal, is covering them. She has a strange encounter with an old man. He warns Godzilla will return and fills her in on the Guardian Monsters. Yuri's dad is high up in the military. He tells her about the first Godzilla visit back in 1954. He was there and saw the destruction first hand. He has always wanted to destroy Godzilla. Soon he'll get his chance. First Barugon, one of three Guardian Monsters, who wasn't good enough to get named int he title, makes an appearance just before the big guy makes a big smash when he comes ashore. Godzilla trashes some cityscape's and scares some people before killing them. His nuclear breath is very powerful and leaves a mushroom cloud over the blast site. It's flash is visible for miles. He's definately not the hero in this movie. I don't care for this Godzilla's costume very much especially around the head area. Barugon is the first giant beast to have a battle with Godzilla. They battle in a park near Hakone and the fight is pretty darn good. Baragon takes a beating before he falls. The other Guardian Monsters, Mothra and Ghidorah, make their first appearance soon after. The Japanese military is powerless as the monsters duke it out.There are some good battles with lots of monster on monster action. The Japanese defence force makes a brief appearance before they are toasted by G's atom breath. It's what takes Mothra down. Her spirit goes into Ghidorah unleashing the King inside. Their battles light up the night like the sun. Godzilla is knocked into the water but the fight continues. Sadly even King G is no match for the mighty mutant. When he falls the spirits of the Guardian Monsters are unleashed and they sink Godzilla into the water. Yuki's dad gets the chance to plant a bomb in Godzilla's wound and does so. That finally takes the big guy down. Yuri survives and so does her dad. They honor the fallen Guardian Monsters and as we pan down into the bay we see Godzilla's beating heart and know that he'll be back.I have the Columbian TriStar dvd and it's pretty nice. The uncut movie is widescreen and has a Japanese soundtrack and English subs. It's one of the better of the recent films and a lot of fun to watch.

The 26th Godzilla film looks back to other previous films in the series and cherry picks hooks from them to hang its story on. Godzilla Against MechaGodzilla starts in 1999 and Akane is the gunner on a mazer. The gun fails to kill Godzilla. Moving the maser in retreat she accidentally knocks a military car off the hill and the big guy steps on it. Akane is demoted to a desk job to suffer her guilt alone. Scientists use the original Godzilla's bones to build bio-robot and we all know how transplants go in movies and this is no different. Akane harbors her hatred of Godzilla down in the library. There's a little girl, the daughter of one of the scientists, who figures in the story. Akane gets to be the pilot of MechaGodzilla so she's happy to be able to get some revenge. Yuki meets the scientist and the little girl. The girl tries to get a hook up going. After all the human drama we finally see some monster action. During a test of the MechaGodzilla the real thing is spotted at sea. Big VTOL planes carry MechaG to the big guy who's come ashore to break things. The bio-bot goes out of control after the bones hear the Godzilla roar and trashes the city with missiles and laser blasts. Black eye for the military, huh. they fix that and there are more battles and a bit of human drama. I found it entertaining after having seen it several times. The Columbia TriStar dvd has a nice widescreen copy with Japanese language track and subtitles. There's an English dub track but it's not so good. I like the Godzilla costume in this one better than the last movie. It did well enough at the box office that the series continued. Check back next week for the last two in the series.      

Science Fiction Sunday 162

 

The 23rd Godzilla film came out in 1999 in Japan as Godzilla 2000: Millennium. It came out in the US as Godzilla 2000. I'm watching the US version first on a TriStar dvd that came out in 2000. It's a bit shorter, at 99 minutes, than the Japanese release that ran 107 minutes. I have a copy Hong Kong dvd that has subtitles and runs the original length. G2000 was released in the theaters in the US. TriStar spent $300,000 dubbing the film, more than $10,000,000 promoting the release, and had a box office of about $4,000,000. They never released any Godzilla films in US theaters since then. Toho spent just over $8,000,000 making the movie and they took in about double that in it's Japanese release. The movie restarts the story again. This Godzilla is smaller than the previous few films but larger than the orginal G-monster. See Chart above.

 

The guy in the car is a Godzilla chaser; the other two are his daughter and a reporter looking for a story. Dad started the G-spotting club and they have a lot of high tech gear to keep an eye out for him. They have a close encounter with the big guy at the opening of the movie. They are so close that his breath clouds their windshield. That would make me poop my pants! They all escape, as does the poor lighthouse keeper who has a metal tower dropped on him Buster Keaton style. The movie plot falls back on the alien invasion theme. A huge meteorite is found in the ocean. It's been there for 60 million years. They try to bring it to the surface but it takes off on it's own. Godzilla shows up again and they shoot him with missiles while he's tossing some buildings around. The meteor takes off, files to where Godzilla is and attacks him. G fights back but is knocked into the ocean. The rock surface is broken and the spaceship within is revealed. Oh oh! The ship clamps onto the top of a building and starts drawing all sorts of data about Godzilla from the network. The ship looks fairly good but at times the CGI shows. The military tries to blow it up but that doesn't work. Godzilla and the ship battle again, G gets knocked down and sampled. Dad guesses that the aliens are trying to use Godzilla's regenerative powers to re-create their bodies. Sometimes I think that the characters make such accurate guesses based on little knowledge that it makes me think they had read the script. Things don't go well in the genetics department and the big monster the ship made turns into the monster battling Godzilla in that picture above. Orga only appears in the one film. He gets trampled after a bit and things go back to normal. Not the best of the lot that's for sure but a watchable film with a fairly solid story. The Japanese version is a bit better story wise, the US translation isn't my favorite. It's a matter of taste, Toho liked it enough they didn't release their English dubbed version.

Godzilla returns in 2000 with the 24th film Godzilla Vs Megaguirus. It too looks to the 1954 Godzillaas it's start. The movie shows us a montage of appearances culled from older films. There is a group devoted to destroying Godzilla, the G-Graspers. Terrible name, huh? Their scientists have created a black hole weapon that they hope to capture Godzilla with. A test opens a worm hole to the past and a prehistoric dragonfly pops out to deposit an egg before returning to it's own time. How convenient. As convenient as the stupid kid who picks up the egg and delivers it to Tokyo. It starts oozing goo and the kid tosses it into the sewer. It hatches into a plethora of murderous bug critters. They grow to larger than human size and flood the city. Inspecting the flooded area the G-Graspers find more eggs. They soon hatch and cause great problems. Godzilla destroys some and the G-Graspers attack him with the black hole but they miss. The big guy is pissed and follows the remaining bug critters to the city. The bugs have a giant queen named Megaguirus. It soon starts battling with Godzilla and that results in some nice collateral damage. The G-Graspers have smaller ships than the previous G-Force. Gone are the ponderous flying vehicles, they are replaced with nimble VTOL fighters. Of course they don't work any better and the monsters are free to rampage around for a time. Godzilla toasts Megaguirus with his super atomic breath and then gets blasted by the black hole device for all his trouble. He's gone but don't worry his roar is heard off camera in the epilogue. Even if the audience that saw this in the theatre suspected there would be some more Godzilla films I know for sure there are 4 more coming. Most of the CGI looks ok or better. there's a lot on the screen for the $8.3 million they spent. It didn't do as well in the Japanese release as the previous film, only grossing $10 million. The suits are pretty darn good and mostly the movie is entertaining.

Science Fiction Sunday 161

 

Godzilla Vs SpaceGodzilla is the 21st Godzilla film. It came out in 1994 and you can get it in two versions in the USA. The 2000 Columbia TriStar dvd comes in a double disc set, with the second movie I watched today, and it runs 106 minutes. The tv version, which I had snagged of off Fear Net on cable, has a two minute scene that was cut from the dvd. The tv version isn't letterboxed like the dvd. I also have a widescreen bootleg from Video Daikiaju that runs the 108 minute length but it doesn't look as good. The US versions are English dubbed and the VD version is in Japanese with fan subs. Humans are on an island with BabyGodzilla and they are setting a trap for Godzilla. The Cosmos, the tiny Mothra ladies, appear and warn of a giant space monster headed for Earth. We see it, flying through space, and it looks like Godzilla with giant crystals growing out of it. Back on the island the humans try to implant a device that would control Godzilla but it didn't work. G-Force sends Mogeura, made out of MechaGodzilla from the last movie, to battle SpaceGodzilla in space. Mogeura get's beat down. SpaceG continues to Earth, landing right on the island where BabyG and Godzilla are rockin' with the humans. Godzilla gets defeated and BabyG gets trapped in some crystals. Scientists speculate that SpaceG was created when cells from Godzilla, knocked off in a fight with another monster, travelled into space, fell into a blackhole, merged with some crystals and returned to earth as SpaceGodzilla. I know that was my first guess. Some gangsters capture the psychic girl but she escapes. Mogeura tries to battle SpaceG again but fails. Godzilla finally kicks SpaceG to the ground and even G-Force has to acknowledge the critter is the King Of The Monsters. Like several of the movies in G-movies of the 90's the monster battles and the effects are A-OK but the script is only so-so. It was still fun to watch.

I watched the 22nd Godzilla film, Godzilla Vs Destroyah, and enjoyed that about the same as the previous movie. It's a 1995 film that ends the current series. Godzilla goes after Hong Kong right at the start of the movie. His body is covered with lava like glowing skin. Scientist's figure out the big guy is going into some sort of nuclear meltdown. If his core temp gets to 1200 degrees he'll blow and firestorm will destroy the planet. Well, that can't be good, huh. Some soil samples from the island in the previous movie yield up a new critter, a prehistoric one that was exposed to the oxygen destroyer in the 50's and exposed to radiation in the 90's. It mutates quickly and grows large. First fish are the victims but soon it starts attacking the humans. Godzilla Junior is called by the psychic girl and he gets beat by Destroyah who has grown to Godzilla size by then. Godzilla comes and battles the new monster. Godzilla revives Jr with some atomic breath and finishes off Destroyah. The Super X3 freezes the big guy and the earth is saved. As Godzilla melts away Jr assumes the throne as K of the Ms. Again the effects are pretty good and the story is a bit better than last time. It was a good spot to leave the series. There was supposed to be a ten year hiatus until the 50th anniversary of Godzilla in 2004. The US Godzilla was supposed to fill in with a trilogy of films. The first movie did well opening weekend and it made lots of money at the Box Office but it failed with the critics and fans. No more were made and Toho returned to reimagine the character in 2000. There are plans for a 2012 US Godzilla but I don't know anything much about it.

Science Fiction Sunday 160

 

We're still rockin' the streets of Tokyo with today's movies from the Godzilla series. Rockin' it with monsters and bombs in the 19th film Gojira vs Mosura. It's from 1992 and called Godzilla And Mothra: Battle For The Earth in the USA. I'm watching the Columbia TriStar DVD that sadly only comes in Pan and Scan English Dub flavor. It's part of a two pack with Godzilla Vs King Ghidorah. What's left of the movie does look good. I've got a Video Daikiaju bootleg that is widescreen. It doesn't look as good and it has a different translation. A meteor falls in the ocean and the wave uncovers a huge egg on an island in the pacific. A young man is arrested for wrecking ancient artifacts Indiana Jones style. A member of the goverment, the young man's Ex-wife and some corporate toady come to get him out of jail. They need his archeological skills. I guess he's the best they could do, Japan's Belloq must have been too hard to find. The couple carry on in an annoying way. She wants her alimony and the guy wants to grow up but neither of them knows how to get what they want. Others seem to find it entertaining but not me for some reason. The movie was rushed out after the good ticket sales of the previous movie. The story is pretty much cobbled together from the earlier Mothra movies, mixed together with a dollop of heavy handed eco-message. It still did pretty well, making money for Toho. The meteor wakes Godzilla from the ocean floor where he's been catching 40 winks. It also releases Battra, an ancient monster. We meet the Mothra ladies, tiny humanoids, that appear and toss out some backstory. While the group of humans are moving the giant egg Battra heads for shore and fights off the Japanese army. Plenty of city crushing action with lots of sparks, electric bolts and explosions. They must store a lot of flammable products in the city. More than you'd think was normal. No matter, me like boom boom. Godzilla finally makes an appearance and the egg gets broken open. Larvae Mothra pops out and they battle is on. Battra shows us and the battle continues under the water. Larvae Mothra escapes and Godzilla and Battra falls ino an underwater volcano. Our couple yak some and the corporate toady steals the Mothra ladies. They escape and call Mothra to get some vengeance. There's plenty of collateral damage to the city. Eventually things get settled down and Godzilla gets tossed into the sea while Mothra flies off into space with his little ladies. The effects are pretty good. much better than the script, but there's this flashing strob effect I find annoying. The monsters look good for the most part, larvae Mothra never looks that great in my mind, no matter how they toss him around. Akira Ifikube did the score and that's pretty entertaining. His music is great for just listening to, you know, without the movie to watch. You can still get that Columbia Tristar double disc but searching overseas might turn up a better option. I have recently discovered that a copy of DVDFAB's HD Encryptor can remove the region coding from a foreign DVD. This adds another plus to movie collecting from foreign lands. Finding a region free dvd isn't that hard but not everyone is always going to have one and it's nice to have another option.

 

The 20th Godzilla movie came out in 1993. The Columbia TiStar DVD of Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla II has a widescreen anamorphic picture and both a Japanese and an English audio track. The English dub is pretty sad though and the English subtitles are taken from that track. Listening to the Japanese track with the English subtitles is preferable to just the English audio. I also have a Video Daikaiju bootleg with fan subs on a Japan audio track. It doesn't look as good picture wise though it has a bit more of the image. There are lots of monsters besides the big guy, we see the return of Rodan and Mechagodzilla, plus the creation of BabyGodzilla. We follow some annoying guy around as he trains in G-Force. Of course he's the hero. The scientists of the Japan Defense Force have used the MechaGhidorah technology to build their own MechaGodzilla. He doesn't fair to well in the first battle. A huge egg is found and they bring it to the city of Kyoto. It hatches out a Godzillasaurus which attracts Godzilla to the city. Unable to find the little guy Godzilla trashes the city for my enjoyment. There used to be some nice buildings in that city. The scientists figure out that the Godzillasaurus has a second brain in it's ass. They extrapolate that Godzilla has the same set up and build a weapon to be used to crush Godzilla's second brain. Some little girls sing a song for BabyGodzilla which riles up all the monsters. Rodan turns into Fire Rodan and joins the fun. There are lots of good noisey battles when we aren't wasting time with the humans. One by one the monsters duke it out. When Godzilla is down for the count Rodan sacrifices himself so the big guy can rise again. MechaG is toast. The effects are great and while it's a bit goofy at times it's a good entry in the series.      

Science Fiction Sunday 159

Five years would pass before Toho returned to Godzilla with the 17th Godzilla movie. The 1989 Godzilla Vs Biolante had some sort of script contest and a dentist won with his story. It was changed before it made it to the big screen but several of his concepts, like the plant creature and the psychic girl, remain in the film. The movie was made for about $5 million and it sold a couple of million tickets which brought in $7 million. It was directed by Kazuki Omori, who also re-wrote the script the dentist turned in. He's directed the two films I watched today and he'd write the following two Godzilla films before he is done with the series.  The movie starts back in 1984 in the Godzilla universe created in The Return Of Godzilla. During the clean up of Tokyo scientists collect Godzilla DNA from around the battle areas. Some samples are stolen by a swarthy guy with a crappy beard and a rifle. A scientist gets some of G's DNA and his lab, along with his daughter, is blown up. We jump ahead 5 years, to the present, and the cells are being used to create a Godzilla eating bacteria.  A bio-company threatens to blow up the volcano and release Godzilla if they don't get some of those Godzilla cells. Things go wrong and soon enough the Big Guy is stomping around once again. The scientist, driven mad by the death of his daughter, has created a slurry of Godzilla, rose and daughter DNA which he uses it to create life. Even my mother would say that's crazy but she wasn't there to warn him. The bio-beast-plant grows large and eventually the rose genes take over and the thing, dubbed Biolante, takes root in a bay. Godzilla shows up in Japan and they attack him with the Super X II. It's now remote controlled which is good since it takes a savage beating from Godzilla. There are a good number of minutes of monster mayhem and the complex subplots keep you busy wondering what's going to happen next. It's an entertainingly goofy what with the giant plant monster, there are lots of characters running about to keep you from getting too bored, and things blow up once in a while. Unfortunately it's a movie that isn't available here in the US. There was an Englished dubbed version on VHS tape and laserdisc out in the 1990's but no dvd. Someone gave me a bootleg dvdr from that laserdisc and I watched parts of that. I've got a Video Daikaiju fan subbed bootleg and I watched that all the way through. If you need one you can find one out on the Internet. Maybe someday someone will release a good version here. It reminds me that divisions by country is stupid. It's always something, huh.

 

I did not find the story to Godzilla Vs King Ghidorah as entertaining as the previous film. It's back to a slightly skewed version of the alien invasion story. A spaceship shows up and it turns out to be human's from the future who plan to destroy Japan with monsters so it doesn't become a future superpower. They go into the past near the end of World War 2 to move the dinosaur that would become Godzilla after being exposed to radiation from the nuke tests. That's the Godzillasaurus over on the right. Rather handsome, yes? Some Japanese soldiers are on the island that the dino is on. They are under attack from US soldiers and the dino saves them. They leave and the future humans move the dino and leave baby Ghidorah's behind. They are exposed to the radiation and they turn into the three headed beast that is attacking Japan when the future humans return to the 20th century. Even though the WWII dino was moved out of the range of the nukes it turned into Godzilla when it was exposed to radiation from a sunken Russian sub. It comes out of hiding in the present day of the movie and attacks King Ghidorah who takes an ass whooping. The future people take King Ghidorah into the future and fit it out with mechanical attachments. They bring Mecha-Ghidorah back to the present and the big guy beats them. Both monsters get thrown into the ocean by a sympathetic future human. Don't worry Godzilla will return. For the most part the monster battles are pretty good but the story is weak. There isn't much story consistency across the 1990 series, especially when you throw some time travel in there. They just keep piling plot points on and run like hell when the story starts to topple. Still, it's not awful or anything and there are all the fun monster fights. At least you can pick up a copy of it in a double movie pack with the Mothra movie. The effects and sets are pretty darn good for such a low budget movie. They know how to stretch a dollar in the Japan movie business.

Science Fiction Sunday 158

The  15th Godzilla film The Terror Of MechaGodzilla would be the last film in the series for nearly ten years. The 1975 film did poorly at the box office, less than a million people went to see it when it was released, and Toho shelved everyone's favorite giant building buster. That break was probably a good idea anyway, the movie recycles the tired alien invasion plot once again and even though they toss in a new monster it just wasn't that great, especially if you watched the US version that appeared in the theaters. You can see that hacked up version on the Simitar dvd that came out several years ago. There's a 5 movie dvd box set that can still be found cheaply, though it's really not worth buying. I only mention it for the completest. The US version that played on tv was different again; it added a long prologue with clips from other Godzilla movies making it longer than the Japanese release by 6 minutes. You can see that on the 2007 Classic Media dvd along with the original uncut Japanese version. I watched the Classic Media versions today and parts of both the Video Daikaiju bootleg and the Simitar dvd. When I wrote this the 7 Godzilla Classic Media collection is only $18 on Amazon. Well worth the price since the movies were about 15 bucks each when sold separately.

 

The Terror of Mechagodzilla was called Counterattack of Mechagodzilla or メカゴジラの逆襲(Mekagojira no Gyakushū) and it was directed by Ishiro Honda with music by Akira Ifukube. The movie was written by a woman, Yukiko Takayama, and it's got a bit of a romance. One of the guys in the movie falls for the daughter of the crazy mad scientist who wants to destroy the world because he got beat up by other scientists. Problem is that the daughter is a cyborg and she's working for her dad. The mad scientist had found the titanosaurus in the ocean and using mind control he uses it to attack a ship. He's also working with the alien invaders to fix up the MechaGodzilla. That's part of his revenge plan. There are the usual antics and monster fights with some occasional good collateral damage. Nothing overly spectacular. Eventually the bad aliens are defeated and Godzilla swims out to sea. The movie is more than watchable, but only if you see the Japanese version.

 

Nine years later Toho returned to the Godzilla franchise and the big guy has gotten bigger. The first series of films had the big guy at 50 meters tall and in the newly started series he's gotten 60% bigger. That's 80 meters tall or about 267 feet. Some of the buildings in Tokyo had gotten pretty large over the last decade and he needed to be bigger to get his smash on. The Return Of Godzilla is the official Toho English title. The movie came out in Japan under the title Godzilla in 1984 and it came out in the US in 1985 under the title Godzilla 1985. The US version was edited heavily and new footage with Raymond Burr and some US military men added to make the movie more US-centric. I have a Video Daikaiju bootleg that runs 103 minutes and the US version is about 90 minutes so you can see there is a lot of material missing. The Japanese version is the one to watch but for some reason there isn't a legit US dvd to be had. Same with Godzilla Vs Biolante. Weird, huh. Oh, well. the internet provides.

The movie starts with a ship at sea, it gets attacked, and we know that Godzilla is back. He's also dropping giant 6 foot long fleas. Yuck, huh! The movie ignores the previous sequels as if they had not happened. It's 30 years after the first Godzilla movie and this is only the second appearance of the big guy. Something destroys a Russian sub and they get all yelly. Once they find out it was Godzilla they demand to drop a bomb on the critter. The US, not wanting to be left out of bombing something, tosses it's demands in the Japanese Prime Minister's face. The PM says hold the fuck up! No nukes! The Japanese Defense Force has tanks, missiles and the Super-X. It's a big fat VTOL spaceship looking craft that's got some super deadly cadmium missiles that knock Godzilla out. The Russians launch a nuke and the US explodes it in upper atmosphere. The radioactive fall out revives Godzilla and he beats the Super-X to the ground and pushes a building over on it. The scientists figure out a way to lure Godzilla into a volcano and they blow it up with him inside. Don't worry, he'll enjoy basking in that refreshing molten mass until next time. It's more like the early Godzilla films than the ones from the 1970's, somewhat more dark and much more deadly for the citizens unlucky enough to be out when Godzilla comes calling. It's a fun restart of the series and worth seeing.