Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

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edgaguirus
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by edgaguirus »

Great for any afternoon. Or late night movie.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by eabaker »

edgaguirus wrote:Great for any afternoon. Or late night movie.
But not the morning. No, no... Never the morning.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by GalacticPetey »

This movie's quality improves by 50% when viewed past noon.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Shobijin »

Surprised that this movie is a favorite of many here. To me, watching every film in order again, it is another movie that doesn't feel right for Godzilla.

My main problem is that it is a campy James Bond film and dated with the 1960's dance music score, i.e. it is not a Godzilla movie.

The tension and suspense just isn't there for me, especially with the last movie being hardcore sci-fi (Astro Monster) which threatened the entire earth.

The Japanese version is better than the English dubs I watched as a kid and a few years ago. I was also pleasantly surprised how well the plot moved along, but the good feelings were negated by not seeing Godzilla for so long. It is ironic that he and Mothra were both sleeping for the first half, because I was dozing off too, but held out once the fights started. The island battles and environment were cool.

Ebirah looks and acts great, but Godzilla's costume is awful and falling in love with the woman was out of character. The tone of the film can't seem to settle on being played straight (the serious plot of finding his brother and kidnapped natives) or pure cheese like the 1960s Batman TV show (the balloon to Infant Island + volleyball fighting).

Missed Mothra's real song by the Shobijin.

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Ookondru99 »

I really enjoy the scene where godzilla first wakes up. The lightning striking, his fingers twitch, and then his eye snaps open (all while i believe Ebirah's theme is playing). The music matches the scene well; even my sister (not a G-Fan) saw godzilla wake up and said 'that's pretty cool'. Probably among my top 5 entrances for godzilla in a g-flick.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by eabaker »

Shobijin wrote:The tension and suspense just isn't there for me, especially with the last movie being hardcore sci-fi (Astro Monster) which threatened the entire earth.
I've noticed that your commentaries on these movies often reflect watching them as a continuous series. Most of them really work better, though, viewed as relatively independent events. "Another movie with Godzilla," rather than "the next Godzilla movie," if you will.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Legion1979 »

You raise a good point. For example, many people will knock KKvsG because the tone is so different compared to the first two films. But Japanese audiences watching the genre evolve in real time clearly didn't have a problem with it, considering how much money it made.

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by DrewTheKing »

Ookondru99 wrote:Still my favorite godzilla movie, at least of the showa series. Whether it's due to nostalgia, the setting, or the actors I always enjoy throwing this movie on. Great for a lazy sunday afternooon.
Totally agree, I'm a big fan of the Godzilla films with the campy tropical vibe, so naturally this is one of my favorites along with Son of Godzilla

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Ookondru99 »

DrewTheKing wrote:
Ookondru99 wrote:Still my favorite godzilla movie, at least of the showa series. Whether it's due to nostalgia, the setting, or the actors I always enjoy throwing this movie on. Great for a lazy sunday afternooon.
Totally agree, I'm a big fan of the Godzilla films with the campy tropical vibe, so naturally this is one of my favorites along with Son of Godzilla
Amen! I also enjoy SoG but not quite as much as GvtSM. I think that has to do with me growing up on Sea Monster, while I first saw SoG much later. I also am not a big fan of Minya so that also probably has something to do with it.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Mechagigan »

SoG, naturally, is a bit more lax and less adventurous than this movie. What I love about Ebirah is that Godzilla only adds to the story - it's already compelling and fun enough, on it's own. Add a couple of giant monsters, and you've got one crazy ride.

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by eabaker »

Yes, it's much more a movie including Godzilla than it is "a Godzilla movie," but really the same could be said about Ghidrah and, even more so, Monster Zero. It was kind of par for the course for a few years there.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by GodzillaFanatic2001 »

Does anyone know what is wrong with Godzilla's roar at one point? At around 1:08:51, when he throws a rock at the Red Bamboo base, his roar sounds all off, as if there's a warble in the audio. What's up with that?
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Stevo_1985 »

GodzillaFanatic2001 wrote:Does anyone know what is wrong with Godzilla's roar at one point? At around 1:08:51, when he throws a rock at the Red Bamboo base, his roar sounds all off, as if there's a warble in the audio. What's up with that?
I know exactly what point your talking about. I always just attributed it a hiccup in the audio.

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That or he was fiending for some nuclear material, he was eying that plant up like Winnie on honey.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Zarm »

‘The name’s Ebirah… Sea Monster Ebirah.’

The south seas era is here, with my unabashed favorite of the showa era. Oh, I’ll hardly claim that it’s objectively better than most of the classics that have preceded it; it’s silly but fun, certainly a dramatic lightweight bordering on the zany. It’s famously repurposed from a King Kong script, and the Kong elements are blatant and numerous.

But to me, that’s all part of its charm. Ebirah, Horror of the Deep is a bright, colorful spectacle of a film, a well-cinematographed showcase for some of the most impressive visuals we’ve yet gotten in a Godzilla film. The tone is light, the pace keeps moving… all in all, it’s just fun. And like Voyager over Deep Space Nine or the Raimi Spider-mans over The Dark Knight, I’ll prize the fun in my entertainment over the dark, tortured ‘depth’ any day.

The characters are, admittedly, a mixed bag. Ryota is an oddball, keeping the audience at arm’s length (though I’ll give him this- his reaction to realizing he’s too high to get off the balloon is ABSOLUTELY the smart one!). The duo that he meets at the dance competition don’t develop much of a personality at all, nor does latter addition Dayo (who mostly serves as the Ann Darrow for this Kong-like Godzilla). Thus, despite being the farthest thing we get from a perspective character, and introduced as an antagonist to our audience POV-characters at the start, it falls to Yoshimura to be our primary protagonist… a role he fills with charm and aplomb. It’s an incredibly non-traditional way to tell a story, but somehow, it works.

The Red Bamboo make an interesting set of villains, in that their motivations are never clearly explained. They’re apparently well-funded mercenaries and terrorists, yet the Infant Islanders talk about them like arch-nemeses, a feuding tribe from a distant island. They are comic-book-character cyphers, in a lot of ways- but their incorporation into the Infant Island mythos, and indeed the inclusion of Infant Island and Mothra as an incidental, known part of the ‘expanded universe’ of the film, bring a great feeling of scope to the production. It’s like ‘infant islander’ is now a known character class; it’s a well-enough established bit of lore that they can appear even in stories that aren’t directly about Mothra. That almost makes up for her snubbing in Astro-Monster.

Sadly, shabby-Mothra is the shoddiest thing in this picture, with everything from design and execution to effects being horribly sub-par. Boring wings stuck to the side of a dirty mop flaps around, and arrives to rather ignominiously kick Godzilla around after he’s already won the day. It feels like a strange afterthought… like she was added after all the budget had already been spent. Also, Infant Island is on its third mutation (after the killer jungle of the original film, and the barren caverns of the intervening films), and even the shobijin look distractingly different. It’s odd; for all the film’s visual successes, everything related to Mothra looks like a low-budget fan-film inclusion.

Ebirah, as a kaiju, looks a lot better. (Is it just me, or does he get boiled-lobster redder every time the atomic breath is used? That’s a great touch.) He has a distractingly-twangy James Bond theme (indeed, the entire jaunty score tends to undercut the action happening onscreen), but a coldly lethal introduction, with both his giant claws, and his skewering of the escaping natives being quite intimidating enough to overcome the unimposing musical theme. The glowing eyes make just the right finishing touch, and both above and below the water, his scenes are expertly filmed. Hardly the most powerful of kaiju, but darned good-looking!

The Giant Condor, meanwhile, remains the same delightfully-random treat that he’s always been; serving as the T-rex analogue for the Kong script, he attacks with fury and goes down in flames- lovable precisely for how hilariously random his appearance is. Never change, Giant Condor- we love you just the way you are.

That brings us to Godzilla. Probably owing to the Kong-origins, he isn’t exactly where we last saw him in Astro-monster, hinting at a brutal battle of some sort between now and then… but wow, is that reveal played wonderfully. The delightfully-monochrome image of the slumbering Godzilla is a masterpiece of light and shadow, perfectly lit and contrasted to give a wonderful sense of scale and reality. It’s one breathtaking shot in a movie full of them.

Once he’s awake, the repurposed script certainly has the Big G acting strangely- sitting down for a nap, creepin’ on a girl, throwing rocks, doing dances (alas, it appears that Planet x madness has caught on!), playing with a defeated enemy’s body as a trophy, revived by lightning… I found it noteworthy that despite the rapid heel-turn in the Ghidorah duology, in this film, Godzilla is treated a bit more tentatively. Perhaps it merely reflects a wary world that had begun to think of him as a hero but then got burned with the Xiliens used him to attack, but I found it interesting that they tapped the breaks, even pulled back a bit, on his hero-transition. If this film had come between Ghidorah, The Three-Headed Monster and Invasion of the Astro-Monster, the progression would have been just about perfect.

Godzilla (with notably cloudy eyeballs) is in fine force here, tearing through the opposition. The jet sequence is a notable, strong production, including the clever use of animated jets; it’s nicely ambitious. I love the bit where he claps a jet apart between his hands. (On the downside, I have to question what that pilot that got tail-swatted was up to; even if the tail he was ultra-low-altitude flying RIGHT AT hadn’t killed him, there was a shear rock wall just a few feet behind it. There was kind of no way that flightpath was going to turn out well for him…) And also, a ticked-off Godzilla (who, after all, was woken up with a giant condor right up in his grille, followed by an immediate jet attack) rampaging through the Red Bamboo base was pretty great.


But, as mentioned before, it’s the cinematography and effects that really shine here. The visual pallet is lush, with some great location shooting in amongst decent island sets and nicely Bond-esque villain lairs. The sight of Ebirah’s giant claw rising out of the water (especially in stormy weather) is a beautiful, perfectly-realized image of scale and power, aided nicely by some excellent miniatures with more-realistic puppets. (Though the brothers rowing in a canoe gets just close enough to realistic motion to enter disturbing uncanny-valley territory without quite being absolutely convincing). The underwater scenes are nicely realized, as is Ebirah getting blasted back by atomic breath, the animated rock-throw match, and, despite its lack of resemblance to an actual mushroom cloud, the chillingly spectacular final destruction of the island, which certainly drives home the terrifying power of a nuclear arsenal even if it doesn’t quite get the look ‘right.’ Heck, I’m a lot more scared of nuclear power after watching Devil’s Island go up than I ever was after the original Gojira.

The plot moves along haphazardly, especially with the incredibly-weak justification for getting everything rolling. The newspaper scene is oddly dull for something so short, the characters are, as mentioned, a little strange, and even on the island, the plot moves in fits and starts, leaping forward like a Moffat Doctor Who script and leaving the audience to fill in the blanks. Yet for all that, and a strangely-jazzy soundtrack to boot, this movie is just so darn much fun that I can’t help but love it. I wouldn’t call it the best-made of the Showa films by a long shot, but if there’s one I want to pop in just to enjoy it, or see something that makes me appreciate the art and craftsmanship that went into these films, this will probably be the one (well, this, or Godzilla vs. Mothra). It’s the epitome of ‘fun, goofy Godzilla’ while still staying on the ‘laughing with it, not at it’ side of the line that films like vs. Megalon might cross. All its oddities add up to more than the sum of their parts, producing an off-kilter anomaly in the Godzilla canon that really ought to bring a smile to anyone’s face- and it looks gorgeous while doing it.

Not bad for a film that started out as my childhood least-favorite. :)
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Mastergodzilla »

JVM wrote: frankly, this film has some of the best characters in the series and Ebirah's one of Godzilla's more underrated opponents.
I so agree!
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by Rody »

That's a great write-up, Zarm. I pretty much agree with everything there. Count me in the camp who loved this film since childhood.

I don't think the Kong analogues are too obvious, though. A few are conspicuous, but Godzilla had been throwing rocks since Ghidrah, and his interest in Daiyo is ambiguous viewed on its own. I read it more as, "hey, there's a tiny human insect that didn't run away", rather than, "ooh, a pretty girl!".
Godzilla's portrayal in this film and Monster Zero is my favorite across the franchise; I think it's the most literal representation of Godzilla as a living WMD we've ever seen. Godzilla first appears dormant, and it's only through human interference/manipulation that Godzilla becomes a wrathful force of destruction. Godzilla may not be relevant to the first half of the film, but he commands the second half; and in that sense I think this movie nails what's important about Godzilla's screen presence.

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by godzilla5417 »

I find this film quite funny, I know it's not a good movie but it's fun to watch thats for sure.It does get kind of boring towards the end, although all the parts with Godzilla are great!
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by edgaguirus »

It's very fun to watch, and has one of Takarada's best roles.
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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by KuboSensei »

I didn't like in my 12-14 year old "Godzilla is unstoppable" years, but when I loosened up and just allowed myself to have a good time, it surprised me with its beachy, 60s monster jun

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Re: Talkback Thread #7: Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

Post by MechaGoji Bro7503 »

Rewatched it today, and my opinion changed. I really liked, a really have a good and fun time film. The Godzilla suit bugs me a bit. Lots of recurring actors, thats nice. Still not in my top 10, but still entertaining. Overll 7/10. Its weird, im starting to love every Godzilla movie after rewatching, even to ones I thought I hated.
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