invasion of astro-monster (1965)
“on earth, you gave this terrifying monster the name of ghidorah. everything is numbered here. the monster is zero.”
apparently there are a lot of complaints about the special effects budget being noticeably smaller in this one, as well as quite a bit of footage from previous films being reused, but i honestly wasn’t even a little bothered? and like, that brief little godzilla and rodan vs. ghidorah fight at the end is actually a drastically better fight than the bigger, longer one in ghidorah, the three-headed monster? (on a more personal/thirsty note, there’s a moment in the brief fight on planet x where godzilla just runs full speed at ghidorah, jump-tackles him, and briefly straddles him, and i am so fucking jealous of that three-headed bitch.)
in addition to that pretty worthwhile fight at the end, we get a pretty extended sequence of godzilla, rodan and ghidorah just kinda stomping around destroying buildings and it kinda super works for me. this sequence has a ton of closeups of godzilla destroying things by stepping on them or just carelessly thrashing his tail around if you’re into that kind of thing, not that... not that, uh, i am or anything *nervous laugh* the uh absolute helplessness of the humans’ massive artillery barrages to do anything to even so much as slow the monsters down is... uh... also definitely not a huge turn-on or anything. ok but seriously this sequence definitely doesn’t only work for me because i’m a thirsty bitch (... though it certainly doesn’t hurt), it’s also just pretty effective in spite of the alleged constraints on the special effects budget.
a lot of the joy of this film also comes from the fact that it’s a flying saucer movie and a kaiju movie combined, and honestly i really genuinely enjoyed the xians as the big alien menace. their flying saucers look fantastic (and somewhat archetypal), their costumes are very space agey and awesome-looking. they make grand threats and ultimatums, demand humanity’s submission and obedience (which i’d obviously be inclined to grant)... it’s just everything you would ever want from a flying saucer movie but also there are fucking kaiju in it!! what more could you want?
this film continues the trend of giving godzilla plenty of personality. when the xians’ flying saucer pulls him out of the lake, we get the revelation that he cuddles his fucking tail when he sleeps, that is the most adorable thing ever i just... i don’t even know, guys! and then he’s being flown around by that flying saucer for a while still cuddling his tail and it’s the most adorable thing ever and just asdfgagljakdgh. in the fight scenes, he bounces around like a cocky boxer or professional wrestler or something and idk it just looks so much fun to be him, y’know? i will cop to the fact that i thought the victory jig on planet x was a smidge excessive, but it didn’t “break” the movie or character for me or anything and i am just super not here for people who are excessively bent out of shape about it, y’know? but all the other little things this movie does to give him a little more personality are very welcome imho.
honestly, my only real complaint here is why was my girl left out of the fun? i would have loved a little passing reference to the xians knowing that mothra wouldn’t be as easy to mind control as godzilla and rodan or her being too naturally “good” to be swayed or something like that. but also it’s a little weird the humans didn’t at least consider turning to her for aid. i know the out-of-narrative reason is probably that they just didn’t want to include her in this particular film, but idk, it just felt off to not even mention her given the situation, y’know?
attendant to all of this was, of course, the fact that what honda was going for was a very optimistic notion of humanity uniting under a banner of science to vanquish the otherwise seemingly insurmountable threats we’re facing. which, for the record, is also the goal of communism. so like, if this sounds like a great idea to you, i can recommend some reading material. just saying.
anyway, tl;dr, i’m gay for space and gay for godzilla. of course i like this one. a-rank
ebirah, horror of the deep (1966)
“if any of you try to escape, you’ll only end up being caught by ebirah!”
i really didn’t like this one the first time i saw it!! it was the english version, but i didn’t notice any huge differences in the japanese version? maybe i was just in a better mood this time?
the surfing music still seemed silly, but silly doesn’t always mean out of place. this was a delightfully ridiculous movie and in that context it’s not out of place at all. no, this movie doesn’t compare favorably to ishiro honda’s epics, but that’s also not what it’s trying to be! it’s trying to be joyfully goofy and it’s succeeding!
i love the continuity of having infant islanders playing a major role! and daiyo gets more agency than any infant islander ever has aside from the fairy twins. and my girl mothra gets to go on a rescue mission again! and my boy godzilla is battle horny when she shows up so he tries to get her to fight him and she’s like “babe! NO! i got serious stuff to do” and smacks him around a little because she does love him but that’s it. yknow, i was today years old when i realized that godzilla is the bottom in that relationship, but now i’m kinda mad i never realized it before. Of COURSE mothra’s the top. b-rank
son of godzilla (1967)
“it’s an island of monsters!”
oh. right. we’re up to this part of the series.
i mean, this is still worlds better than all monsters attack, but that’s not exactly a high bar to clear. anyway, i don’t have any great desire to dump on this movie so let’s just get through these and get back to the good stuff. c-rank
king kong escapes (1967)
“the natives call him king kong. he said we're trespassing on kong's home.”
it’s about as good a king kong movie as anyone could make on the budget honda was given, and with rankin/bass demanding that it adhere to material from a television show that literally no one cared about. kinda hard to believe mechani-kong pre-dated mechagodzilla by over five years.
the one thing i would’ve maybe liked to see done differently is spending more time with the kaiju and less with the humans (though this wasn’t the worst human plot in a kaiju movie), especially considering most of the brunt of the bad special effects was anything where they tried to show both humans and kaiju doing things on screen at the same time. plus, kaiju are just better than humans. even when the kaiju is just a dumb giant monkey. c-rank
destroy all monsters (1968)
“as godzilla prepares the other monsters to attack, there seems to be little doubt as to who will win.”
i’m pretty glad this didn’t end up being the last shΕwa era godzilla movie, but i do appreciate the movie we got out of them thinking it might be. they really went for it, didn’t they? also ghidorah just getting totally stomped by the combined might of all the other monsters towards the end of this is pretty easily my favorite ghidorah fight ever. (and yes, the parts where that stomping was literal rather than figurative made me horny, shut up.) a-rank
all monsters attack
“life sure is murder when you're so darn small!”
this is pretty easily the worst godzilla movie, and not even just because half of the movie is clips from son of godzilla and ebirah, horror of the deep. i genuinely think the connective tissue that holds this glorified clipshow together is much worse. it’s all the child protagonist’s dream, and minilla is human-sized and can talk for some reason, and the human child learns to stand up to his bullies but then literally becomes a bully??? and it’s totally played for laughs??? and the whole thing is just weird and bad and low-effort. seriously, this is just awful. at least it’s short. d-rank
space amoeba (1970)
“even if a man’s cells are taken over, he has his soul.”
quick note: if you’re scratching your head wondering what this is doing in the godzilla zone, the millennium era godzilla movie tokyo s.o.s. is actually sneakily an indirect sequel to this? so, uh, yeah! that’s a thing! the kiryu universe is super interesting, actually? because the vast majority of godzilla sequels aren’t canon to it, but like… this and frankenstein vs. barugon and even motherfucking varan are? wild.
anyway, not gonna lie, based on the title alone i was picturing something more like the giant amoeba from that one star trek episode attacking a city? i wasn’t so much expecting glowy space stuff turning a squid, a crab, and a turtle into giant monsters. but that’s our lot!
i enjoyed this for what it is. it’s engaging enough for the most part, but yeah. i often don’t love kaiju movies where the kaiju’s entire deal is that it’s just a giant monster that destroys things. i prefer a bit more character and personality in my giant stompy boys. c-rank
godzilla vs. hedorah (1971)
“it probably came from a sticky, dark planet far, far away.”
i remembered not really loving this one the first time i saw it, and i definitely liked it slightly better this time around but it’s still not really my cup of kaiju.
my biggest and most obvious complaint is that the soundtrack in this one is just awful? like. wow. i’m not even really entirely sure what they were going for.
i do remember one of my big problems with it the first time was what i found to be a ponderous pace, and dreary visuals. but it’s worth noting that my first viewing came amid my first, much hastier marathon of godzilla movies where i think at one point i was easily watching 3 or 4 of them a day.
given more time to properly appreciate this as an individual movie, i’ll actually allow that the at times almost oppressive tone actually fits the larger themes of the movie extremely well. but, you know, shockingly the one that’s thematically about oppressive smog and pollution didn’t fare well when marathoning the otherwise largely vibrant series.
of course, this is one of those “environmentalist” movies that doesn’t actually analyze the root problem at all (it’s capitalism), and those always end up blaming “humanity” or whatever and end up being very misanthropic and don’t actually do anything to help, but oh whale. kinda par for the course.
lastly, uh, yeah. this movie is very horny? like, at one point hedorah drops godzilla in a pit and then fills the pit up with toxic sludge? and there’s all kinds of people getting slimed? and godzilla gets slimed a bunch of times? and… yeah. pollution is kinda kinky. who knew. c-rank
godzilla vs. gigan (1972)
“so what do you want me to do? those damn monsters have got us completely beaten.”
absolutely one of the sillier entries and i love it. silly doesn’t need to mean low-effort! the human characters’ story is completely integrated into the kaiju story, the fights are good (though they have more gore than my taste), the aliens are kinda hilarious, and godzilla and angurius are adorkable boyfriends!!
it’s not one of the best or most legendary entries into the series, but damn it, this is how you do a sillier kaiju sequel!! b-rank
godzilla vs. megalon (1973)
“i will unleash megalon to protect our land, our underwater world!”
this one is good! come at me haters!
yeah, i know it has a bunch of reused footage. yeah, i know a sizable contingent of the fandom hate jet jaguar. yeah, i know seatopia is silly. i also don’t caaaaaaare.
look, i don’t want every kaiju film to be like this! it probably doesn’t even crack my top 20. but it’s good, damn it! relax and enjoy the sillier kaiju movies! b-rank
godzilla vs. mechagodzilla (1974)
“when the red moon sets, and the sun rises in the west, two monsters will appear to save the people.”
the sequence where mechagodzilla is disguised as godzilla and attacks tokyo & fights angurius before eventually being fought off by the real godzilla is one of my favorite sequences of the entire series. it’s just such a great concept, and it’s great to see angurius get some love in (sadly) his last major appearance to date.
the aliens being essentially planet of the apes aliens under their disguises rules and i wish we got more of them not in disguise. oh well. i also love how aliens in this series are always basically bond villains, in this case including a ridiculous death trap.
king caesar is a bottom tier kaiju, but it’s at least cool that he moves fast? at least it differentiates him a bit and i also appreciate the okinawan priestess lady singing basically straight up a love song to him to summon him??? more humans blatantly thirsty for kaiju in these movies please. b-rank
terror of mechagodzilla (1975)
“don’t try to escape, earthling, or you’ll force us to kill you!”
ishirΕ honda returned for what would prove to be the last of the shΕwa era godzilla films, finishing what he started and giving us a film that has a lot more going on than a cursory examination might reveal.
first and foremost what we have here is a direct sequel to godzilla vs. mechagodzilla. and that’s not a direction these films often go? so that’s immediately interesting. i do appreciate the kind of storytelling breathing room this gives honda. he doesn’t have to waste any time establishing who the aliens are and what they want, just a little dialogue and some shots of the damaged mechagodzilla. (which is just cool, honestly.)
when comparing the two movies, i don’t think there’s anything nearly as cool as the disguised mechagodzilla’s reveal in this one, but the movie as a whole just feels tighter and more serious. not overly serious, though, don’t worry. just the right amount. and perhaps relatedly, godzilla himself has so much more gravitas. and i didn’t even realize how much i was missing that until it was back.
the other most obvious difference between this and its immediate predecessor is king caesar being replaced by titanosaurus and YEAH there’s really no contest there. king caesar was... fine, i guess. titanosaurus is my son and i love him.
this is also a continuation (and culmination) of a now 15 film franchise, 8 of which honda himself directed. the character scarcely resembles the nightmarish avatar of destruction he was when honda first brought him to life. indeed, he is at this point the protagonist of the series, something that would’ve been unthinkable in 1954.
i don’t think they knew this would be the last film of the shΕwa era, else honda probably would’ve pulled out all the stops and brought back the mothras and anguriuses and rodans of the world, even if only for cameos, to give our boy a proper sendoff. but i think this was a fine note to end on, including godzilla literally swimmimg off into the sunset. long live the king. a-rank
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