The Return of Godzilla / Godzilla 1985 Speculation Thread

[omgitsgodzilla]

There are a lot of scenes with subtitled dialogue and a few location title cards, in the Japanese version at least. I haven't seen the International version, but unless it keeps the Japanese text, he'd have to use something else for those shots.

[miguelnuva]

Is there an actually English dub for the international Return of Godzilla? I would love to see that alongside the International Godzilla 2000 were never going to get.

[omgitsgodzilla]

Yeah, the International dub is what was released to the European market IIRC. That's where the "Return" title comes from.

[miguelnuva]

Sounds fun.

[Terasawa]

It's surprising to me that the international version is still treated as some kind of ultimate mystery. It's been released on video a few times (albeit never in the U.S.) and is fairly easy to obtain through illegal methods.

It was dubbed in Hong Kong by Matthew Oram's company. It corresponds to the complete Japanese version of the film. The sound design is based on a possible mono mix of the Japanese version (all home video versions of the Japanese cut use a stereo mix). The onscreen English title is "The Return of Godzilla."

Space Hunter M has a few videos of this version on his YouTube channel:

Toho's English trailer

Recreation of a Portuguese video spot based on the intntl version

"Gonna see the editor about your story?"

Nuclear weapons.

[Space Hunter M]

It's surprising to me that the international version is still treated as some kind of ultimate mystery.

I posted an entire transcript of the dub here as a joke once.

Here's a list of differences between the monaural mix the export dub uses and the regular Japanese "A" mix:
http://humanreceptacles.blogspot.com/20 ... rical.html

[Goji]

There are a lot of scenes with subtitled dialogue and a few location title cards, in the Japanese version at least.

Right, and just like all of the Toho's other export versions, any on-screen Japanese text was removed.

There are actually more location supers in G'85, oddly enough.

[omgitsgodzilla]

Right, so those shots would be taken from the textless International source as opposed to the Japanese source with the text.

[GFAN198423]

I hope they actually get this distributed just to see what was done. I love the 84/85 movie and anything to do with it piques my interest. Seems unlikely, but it's always possible a bootlegger could offer a better release than a legit company, as we know some companies that release obscure titles seem to try to make a quick buck off the rarity without putting in due quality.

[goji1986]

Most of the entries at Godzilla1985.com are written by someone named Riggan Rose. I went looking for him and found this written by "Riggen Rose" at https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/24/992157 , posted five months ago:

I'm working on prepping a project for blu-ray using Sony Vegas Pro 13. My two source videos are different frame rates. The first and most important source vid is running at 23.976 fps. The second video's rate is 29.970 fps. Before I realized the two files were different rates I made a test bluray of the final cut to quality check for editing mistakes. This is when I noticed severe motion blur on my primary footage and realized the source video was running at 23.976 fps. I rendered a new video using 23.976 fps inserting 3-2 pulldown, and it has worked wonders in correcting all the motion blur that I saw with the larger video. However, as expected, the smaller source video that runs at 29.970 is now left with noticeable motion blur even after I set the video to "disable resample" before rendering my final file.

Is there a way to correct this in Vegas? I would like to avoid converting the smaller 29.970 source video if possible. I did try to convert the larger file up to 29.970 so the frame rates of both source vids would match. But the final result left a bit to be desired. Although the motion blur on the larger file improved, it is not as smooth as when I render using 23.976 fps inserting 3-2 pulldown.

The results on the larger file are where I want them. Just need to correct the motion blur of the smaller 29.970 video.

He's likely talking about his source videos for Godzilla 1985 and the International Cut of The Return of Godzilla. It sounds to me like his primary file started life as 24FPS (frames per second), was converted to 30FPS for home video (every third frame is a duplicate of the one before it, making 24 frames into 30 frames), and was converted back to 24FPS (someone's attempt at removing the duplicated frame via what's called a "3:2 pulldown", which may have deleted the wrong frames) before he ever got ahold of it.

It's possible he is sourcing the American edit from the MonstersHD broadcast, which would have aired in a 1080i stream at 29.97 FPS.

[Goji]

Right, so those shots would be taken from the textless International source as opposed to the Japanese source with the text.

If there was something other than a PAL VHS source on home video, yes, but sadly, there isn't.

His only option would be to (somehow) track down the impossible to find 1080i rip of the Monsters HD version of G'85, and use what he can from that. But, even if he somehow managed to do that, the scene with the politicians was basically butchered by New World, so he'd still be left with no good textless source for the parts of that scene that aren't in G'85.

[omgitsgodzilla]

Hey, this is a fan release we're talking about. He could well be using the VHS source for certain scenes; Harmy uses the horrendous LD-transferred 2006 DVDs as a source for the despecialized edition when he has to. The MHD explanation makes more sense though.

[goji1986]

EDIT
Post deleted since it links to confirmed bootleg.

UPDATE:
Toho has officially brought the hammer down on the site with a publicly viewable C&D. So that's that.

[G1985]

EDIT
Post deleted since it links to confirmed bootleg.

UPDATE:
Toho has officially brought the hammer down on the site with a publicly viewable C&D. So that's that.

Oops!

[aaronjmoss]

Given the discussion (and skepticism) surrounding this "project," I wanted to clear up any misconceptions about whether it is officially authorized by Toho. It is not. Below is a letter I posted on Godzilla1985.com, which appears to have since been removed:

To the Operators of This Website and the Producers of the “Godzilla 1985” Project:

I am an attorney representing Toho Co., Ltd. As you likely already know, Toho owns all of the copyrights in the Godzilla character and each of the Godzilla films, including The Return of Godzilla, aka Godzilla 1985 (the “Film”). I understand that you are producing and promoting the release of a DVD/Bluray disc containing a “frame-by frame re-creation” of the Film. I also understand that you are planning for the DVD to include other copyrighted Toho property, including the original Japanese version of the Film.

This activity infringes Toho’s exclusive right to reproduce, adapt, distribute and otherwise exploit the Film. The fact that you claim that this is a “fan project” does not excuse the infringement. By proceeding without Toho’s permission, you are negatively impacting Toho’s ability to decide the manner and timing of the Film’s exploitation, and are interfering with Toho’s ability to officially license a re-release of the Film.

Your conduct is also likely to cause consumers to believe that your activities have been authorized by Toho. Indeed, even sophisticated fans of the Godzilla series already have been confused into thinking this is an officially authorized release.
Toho takes its intellectual property rights very seriously and does not hesitate to take all appropriate action when those rights are violated. We therefore must demand that you immediately stop your infringing conduct. While Toho certainly does not want to bring litigation over this matter, especially against a fan, if you do not stop your project, take down your website and confirm that you will not distribute or otherwise exploit the Film, Toho will unfortunately have no other choice.
Please get back to me promptly, and in no event later than January 20, 2016 to confirm that you will comply with these requests. I can be reached at amoss@ggfirm.com.

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Sincerely,
Aaron J. Moss

[Barkley]

^Oh SNAP! Go Toho!

-Barkley

[miguelnuva]

Did Toho's lawyer go to other places posting this thing or are we just special.

[G1985]

Given the discussion (and skepticism) surrounding this "project," I wanted to clear up any misconceptions about whether it is officially authorized by Toho. It is not. Below is a letter I posted on Godzilla1985.com, which appears to have since been removed:

To the Operators of This Website and the Producers of the “Godzilla 1985” Project:

I am an attorney representing Toho Co., Ltd. As you likely already know, Toho owns all of the copyrights in the Godzilla character and each of the Godzilla films, including The Return of Godzilla, aka Godzilla 1985 (the “Film”). I understand that you are producing and promoting the release of a DVD/Bluray disc containing a “frame-by frame re-creation” of the Film. I also understand that you are planning for the DVD to include other copyrighted Toho property, including the original Japanese version of the Film.

This activity infringes Toho’s exclusive right to reproduce, adapt, distribute and otherwise exploit the Film. The fact that you claim that this is a “fan project” does not excuse the infringement. By proceeding without Toho’s permission, you are negatively impacting Toho’s ability to decide the manner and timing of the Film’s exploitation, and are interfering with Toho’s ability to officially license a re-release of the Film.

Your conduct is also likely to cause consumers to believe that your activities have been authorized by Toho. Indeed, even sophisticated fans of the Godzilla series already have been confused into thinking this is an officially authorized release.
Toho takes its intellectual property rights very seriously and does not hesitate to take all appropriate action when those rights are violated. We therefore must demand that you immediately stop your infringing conduct. While Toho certainly does not want to bring litigation over this matter, especially against a fan, if you do not stop your project, take down your website and confirm that you will not distribute or otherwise exploit the Film, Toho will unfortunately have no other choice.
Please get back to me promptly, and in no event later than January 20, 2016 to confirm that you will comply with these requests. I can be reached at amoss@ggfirm.com.

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Sincerely,
Aaron J. Moss

Thank you for posting this here. I saw last week that it was also posted at the website Godzilla1985.com. I also see that it has since been removed and his project goes forward, which does not bode well for Mr. Riggan Rose.

[miguelnuva]

Given the discussion (and skepticism) surrounding this "project," I wanted to clear up any misconceptions about whether it is officially authorized by Toho. It is not. Below is a letter I posted on Godzilla1985.com, which appears to have since been removed:

To the Operators of This Website and the Producers of the “Godzilla 1985” Project:

I am an attorney representing Toho Co., Ltd. As you likely already know, Toho owns all of the copyrights in the Godzilla character and each of the Godzilla films, including The Return of Godzilla, aka Godzilla 1985 (the “Film”). I understand that you are producing and promoting the release of a DVD/Bluray disc containing a “frame-by frame re-creation” of the Film. I also understand that you are planning for the DVD to include other copyrighted Toho property, including the original Japanese version of the Film.

This activity infringes Toho’s exclusive right to reproduce, adapt, distribute and otherwise exploit the Film. The fact that you claim that this is a “fan project” does not excuse the infringement. By proceeding without Toho’s permission, you are negatively impacting Toho’s ability to decide the manner and timing of the Film’s exploitation, and are interfering with Toho’s ability to officially license a re-release of the Film.

Your conduct is also likely to cause consumers to believe that your activities have been authorized by Toho. Indeed, even sophisticated fans of the Godzilla series already have been confused into thinking this is an officially authorized release.
Toho takes its intellectual property rights very seriously and does not hesitate to take all appropriate action when those rights are violated. We therefore must demand that you immediately stop your infringing conduct. While Toho certainly does not want to bring litigation over this matter, especially against a fan, if you do not stop your project, take down your website and confirm that you will not distribute or otherwise exploit the Film, Toho will unfortunately have no other choice.
Please get back to me promptly, and in no event later than January 20, 2016 to confirm that you will comply with these requests. I can be reached at amoss@ggfirm.com.

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Sincerely,
Aaron J. Moss

Thank you for posting this here. I saw last week that it was also posted at the website Godzilla1985.com. I also see that it has since been removed and his project goes forward, which does not bode well for Mr. Riggan Rose.

He's an idiot then. Once lawyers get involved its time to quit while your ahead.

[Godzilla21]

My question is how do other bootleg operations not get down or get letters such as these from Toho? I've been using the same company since I started buying these since 1998 and they are still around.