Tags:
Has anybody seen Big Man Japan yet? Pat and I watched it over the weekend when he was home recuperating from his broken ankle. It a faux documentary that follows around a Japanese superhero, "Big Man Japan," whose job is to grow to gigantic proportions and battle the various monsters that attack the country. He's presented as a low-paid government employee whose best days are behind him, but he accepts his lot in life with stoic resignation.
It starts a little slow, but when we see Big Man battling some truly bizarre monsters, it's pretty good.
Action Lad's Pop Culture Mash-Up of the Day:
"Maybe Godzilla came from Oz. Maybe he grew up in Oz and then moved to Japan."
I watched Gamera: The Giant Monster (1965) and Gamera vs. Barugon (1966) over the last couple of days. I remember watching Gamera movies when I was a kid, but (despite the fact that there really weren't that many Gamera movies) I don't remember ever seeing either of these. Hmmm ...
Toshio, the "Kenny" prototype, is the most seriously delusional kid I've ever seen.
Barugon is without a doubt -- and this is really saying something -- the kaiju that most clearly seems to have been designed by a committee of 6-year-old boys. (Not that that's a bad thing.)
"He should walk on all fours, and have spikes on his back and a really BIG spike on his nose."
"Cool. And his blood should be purple."
"Yeah, and instead of breathing fire, his mouth should shoot out freeze rays."
"No, his tongue. He should have a really long tongue, like a chameleon, and whenever he wants to freeze anybody, he has to stick his tongue out at them first. BLEAAHH!!!"
"HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!"
"And ... and ... and his back spikes should shoot rainbows!"
"Huh?"
"His back spikes should shoot rainbows!"
"Dude, that's stoopid!"
"But ... uh ... they're explosive rainbows. If you touch them, you explode!"
"Cool!"
Barugon was always my favorite of Gamera's enemies.
I'm watching the Shout! Factory releases from last year. The transfers (especially of Baragon) are really pretty gorgeous.
I wanted to re-visit this thread for the movies that are not either Godzilla or Gamera movies, although there's no reason we can't discuss those here as well.
Anyhow, last night I watched:
Mosura (1961) (a.k.a Mothra)
Directed by Ishiro Honda
SFX by Eiji Tsuburaya
Music by Yuji Koseki
Starring:
Big-time comedy star (well, in Japan) Frankie Sakai as tenacious, unfunny reporter Fukuda
Lengthy-careered actresss Kyoko Kagawa as girl photographer Michi. You may remember her from Kurosawa's The Lower Depths.)
Genre mainstay Hiroshi Koizumi as young scientist Dr. Chujo (Or "Chuzo", I'm not sure). Koizumi would reprise the role in the 2003 epic Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.
Ken Uehara as old scientist Dr. Harada.
Jerry Ito as vile American "Rolisican" baddy, Clark Nelson,
Kurosawa mainstay Takashi Shimura as the hard-nosed editor. (Are there any "soft-nosed" editors?)
And Yumi and Emi Ito as the Twin Fairies.
An entertaining picture - the special effects are OK - the adult Mothra as somewhat less than convincing, but acceptable. I found the use of Christian imagery in this interesting - I suppose Christianity is as "exotic" in Japan as Shinto is in this country
No flame wars. No trolls. But a lot of really smart people.The Captain Comics Round Table tries to be the friendliest and most accurate comics website on the Internet.
SOME ESSENTIALS:
FOLLOW US:
OUR COLUMNISTS: