Viewing Single Post From: Godzilla Vs Gigan(1972)

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Viewing Single Post From: Godzilla Vs Gigan(1972)
Guardian7	Jul 6 2009, 07:03 PM
Monsterland Associate Posts: 4 Group: Members Member #221 Joined: April 5, 2009	Well... Where do I begin. Stock footage I guess. I have no issues when brief stock footage. Flashes of Kaiju from Monster Island to show that most of the monsters are contained or settled in on whatever island it is they are on. The only movie I think that uses stock footage in a good way is "Godzilla's Revenge" But I have my own reasons for thinking this. There is a bit too much for this film. The Ghidorah & Anguirus battle is one I find exceptionally annoying (just because it was such a prevelant scene in DAM). I can take or leave Godzilla and Anguirus chatting scene. I don't think they actually need to voice it (american Version) or word balloon it (japanese Version). I think the same effect could have been done using body language and thier various modes of roar/cries etc. The Aliens were certainly in line with the other incompetent (standard) aliens of most of the SHOWAera movies. I think Godzilla tower was in particular a "BAD" concept. At least the head could have swung so as to shoot in any direction... after all it is a gun turrent of some sort. I'd blame their ineptness on them being Cockroaches (and at least they have that), but they certainly fall in suit with the inane actions of the aliens that came before them. I do wish they had made some kind of insect suits (instead of real cockroach images) of them. Now to the aspect of the film that ruins it for me... the humans The Artist Gengo Kotaka(Hiroshi Ishikawa) - You want a great example of an incredibly poorly concieved character. Here he is. He is an idiot. His character is lamely executed (I wish) throughout the length of this film. I have never rooted for a character to die more than him (with the possible exception of Mr. Tako of Pacific Pharmaceuticals and a television "station?" show - Ichiro Arishima from KKvG). This character completely bungles his way through the film. It would be okay if he was halfway funny. Ugh... I can't even go on about him... Next is Tomoko Tomoe-artists girlfriend (Yuriko Hishimi) - She is gorgeous... and obviously has something wrong with her. Cause her boyfriend is super-enept-artist-boy Gengo. Why she put up with someone like Gengo should have been the real human backstory of GvG. Frankly though they could have made her the main character of the film and wrote Gengo totally out and the film would have been so much better. She holds her own as a character for being the only human in this film with any shred of confidence. She loses points for being with Gengo (Who I am sure she dumped after the end of the film... hopefuly she kung fu'd him up when she did). Kubota, Head of World Children's Land (Toshiaki Nishizawa) - I liked the concept of this character. It kind of gave a feel that the "Cockroaches" were not aware that a person of Kubota's age would not be heading an organization the size of "World's Children Land". This is an easy clue for the humans to pick up on. I like the arrogance of his character. I just wish he had been a bit more vicious and insect-like and simply offed the pesky humans. Fumio Sudo, Chairman (Zan Fujita) - Another lame character... This guy had an air of both stupidity and some weird sense of being a freaky pervert. I mean... come on... that cigarette scene with Gengo is... creepy. I am surprised Kubota didn't flat out execute and eat him. Guess they needed someone nearly as stupid as Gengo to offset him. Takashi Shima computer/electronics expert (Kunio Murai) - He could have easily have become the hero of this film WAY over Gengo (and should have). He seems a likable enough of a guy. smart. Not very brave. Would have been nice to see him try to make a bolder move. He had that shuffling "aww shucks! I'll do what ya say" kinda sense about him. Machiko Shima -Sister of Takashi (Tomoko Umeda) - boy is she a fretty little thing. Also a very pretty girl... ummm what is she doing hanging out with that hippy? Is it good drugs or something? There has to be a logical answer. Was he her hair stylist? She just seemed to kinda wander around in the film. Just a hapless sister all worried about her abuducted brother Takashi. Shosaku Takasugi- Hippy (Minoru Takashima) - what the hell? The hippy human food processor! You know this guy lives in him Mom's basement. I am surprised they didn't bring in another hippy and do a Japanese play on "Cheech and Chong" Oh Lord... Okay.... that is the main players of this film... (G7: shakes head and puts face in hands) You do realize... if you transformed Gengo into a Great Dane (since his character was such a dog I would pick him) and combined him with everyone else... you would have had the greatest crime-solving-monster-busting team in history... MYSTERY INC. Gengo = Scooby Tomoko = Daphne Shosaku = Shaggy Machiko = Velma Takashi = Fred But wait... there is more. Like this one... Self Defense Force Commander (Gen Shimizu) - This man... actually let Mystery Inc lead a combat squad against a group of soon to be planet conquering aliens... WHATHHELL - it is little wonder Giant Monsters run all over the Nation of Japan with decision makers like that. of course... lucky for him that the Cockroach/Aliens mistook a pen and ink drawing for REAL humans... and shot at them, causing a massive explsion. (just think about it for a second... take it in... crickets chirp merrily) Oh then there is the Temple thing when Scooby... I mean Gengo and Shaggy... oops damn... I mean Shosaku go and investigate the leaders of Children's Land in thier home town. They discover two people. one is the town Priest (Kurayoshi Nakamura) and the other is some elderly Female Assistant at the Temple (Kuniko Ashihara), who I thought at first was going to end up being Kubota's Mom. Well we find out that Kubota died tragically in an accident in the mountains... with his teacher... Fumio Sudo (none other than the chairman of Children's Land). With all of this.. comes the best line of the movie... The Priest is told that Kubota now runs Children's land and is like some advanced mathematician. The Priest laughs and basically tells them that the "HUMAN" Kubota was dumber than a box of Rocks... (That just cracks me up so badly. here we are at the anniversery of this kid's death and a priest says something like that. Come on... it is funny!). Frankly they should have let the real Kubota join the cast. He would have fit right in. Okay... enough about the pathetic humans (or cast so to speak). THE KAIJU Yes. Gigan is a kick butt looking Kaiju. Wicked wicked looking. He actually looks evil. Ghidorah is always a welcome foe. Though his suit is pretty beat up, I don't think it takes away from him. After all... he is Ghidorah! This movie (as much as I dispise the human & Alien stuff in it) has one Rocking kickbutt scene of Gigan and Ghidorah layin down the "City Stomp" law. This just rocks. I really enjoyed watching these two trash the city. Godzilla is just simply Godzilla. He takes an asswhippin though and like was mentioned in someone else's post, he does sudden spring back all rejuvenated (maybe there was something radioactive he absorbed from the Godzilla tower - after all... he was right next to it when he suddenly got all juiced up!) The fights are good... but there is a lot of off timed movements/things going on. Which kinda detracts a bit from the fights. Over all, it is a pretty brutal fight. Anguirus the most under-rated Kaiju is shoved to the background to be kicking fodder for Gigan and Ghidorah. But before all of this he is initially sent by Godzilla to check out that bizarro sound coming from Japan.... Okay... I think everyone gets the wrong impression here when Anguirus comes on shore... The JDF do not win (Though they may think they did). Anguirus doesn't do anything other than stand on the shoreline (after all... he was here seeking the source of that Kaiju calling reel to reel). He gets on shore... the JDF start firing on him... and he simply goes "BAH!" and turns around and goes back to Monster Island to discuss it with Godzilla. Course I personally think it would have been neat to just have Anguirus hang out in Tokyo bay and wait for Godzilla. Anguirus certainly was on the move that day. Swam to Japan... swam back to Monster Island... swam back to Japan... and then helped fight the Kaiju Space threats. He took it all in stride... took his lumps and helped defeat the bug eyed monsters from space. GREAT MOMMENT FOR ANGUIRUS... Reverse catapult into the bad Kaiju. COOL! Overall... the human elements ruin this movie. For me they virtually utterly ruin it. If they had all died, I wouldn't have cared and it would have made it a better movie. Godzilla vs MechaGodzilla uses basically the same size cast and pull it off virtually flawlessly (including Aliens hiding in human form). It is almost the same forumla... even Anguirus takes yet another butt whipping (last we saw of him he fell into a giant fissure on Monster Island in the beginning Godzilla vs Megalon). To me. Godzilla vs Gigan is the second worst movie of the Godzilla series (first being KKvG). Saving grace. Kaiju battles and the intro of Gigan. Thankfully it got better with the trippy next movie Godzilla vs Hedorah. Cya G7


Godzilla Vs Gigan(1972) · Showa Godzilla Films 1954-1975