One of director Ishiro Honda‘s better known pictures, The Mysterians would act as a blueprint on countless “alien invasion” films to come from Toho while also introducing new techniques to the genre. Where as Legend of the White Serpent (1956) was Toho’s first science fiction film to utilize color, Honda’s The Mysterians becomes the first science fiction epic to use the firm’s “Toho Scope” aspect ratio. This “extended widescreen” look to the film would become standard throughout most of Toho’s work, prevailing up until the 1980s before reemerging at the turn of the century for the Millennium series of Godzilla films. This “technical achievement” aside, Honda’s The Mysterians is a rather ho-hum entry in the director’s portfolio of science fiction films. As it stands, The Mysterians has a fairly straight forward plot, which fails to introduce any memorable characters or give the actors much to work with, and while the musical score and special effects are impressive at times, the film really ends up limping to the finish due to the film’s very slow pacing. (more…)

Hard to think that this project started as Godzilla 2, an entry in a contest to see who would pen the screenplay for the 1989 Godzilla film. Submitted by James Bannon, the concept went through an almost total overhaul, nixing Godzilla while changing to a futuristic, cyberpunk-like adventure involving a supercomputer and giant mechs. Unfortunately, the end product is a jumbled mess of lost potential. Gunhed proves to be inadequate in a number of fields including a nonsensical script, astonishingly poor character development, acting which is mediocre at best, and jarring editing techniques; however, the film does feature impressive special effects work by Koichi Kawakita, excellent sets by Kazo Suzuki and an interesting (if not repetitive) score by Toshiyuki Honda.

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Sometimes, a series reaches a stature where even the “lesser” films can’t hurt it due to the other strong entries over the years. Godzilla vs. Megalon is not one of those films. Love it or hate it, one can’t deny the amount of harm Godzilla vs. Megalon has done to the franchise in terms of credibility. The claim could be made that had it not been for Godzilla vs. Megalon Godzilla might never have picked up in the States, as this was the movie which reignited America’s pop culture fascination with the monster. Truth be known, the success of Godzilla vs. Megalon was more due to the advertising, including the elaborate posters of Godzilla and Megalon fighting on the World Trade Center, than the film’s merits. Its place in pop culture aside, the 1973 Godzilla film takes the largest heat for simply failing to do anything right: the story is unfitting for a full length feature, the actors have nothing to portray with their undeveloped characters, the new kaiju seem out of place for a Godzilla film, there is little special effects work involved, and the music is simply horrendous. (more…)

Although its merits as a film are questionable, Godzilla vs. Gigan is actually anything but a widely disliked Godzilla movie among fans. Does this mean the final product is particularly good? Not necessarily, yet there are several things going for the film that account for its appreciation among genre fans despite its more lackluster qualities. Among these are the handling of the movie’s roster of monsters and the drawn out battle. That said, there are numerous aspects that drag the production down. This includes a rehashed story that leaves little room for character development alongside uninspiring performances from the cast, not to mention rampant use of stock footage; however, at least the stock soundtrack by maestro Akira Ifukube is well constructed for the proceedings. (more…)