| Seen by many as the "last
hurrah" in the Showa Godzilla series,
this late 1960's entry in the franchise reunites
many of the principal staff behind Godzilla
(1954) for what was, at one time, intended
to be the last movie in the series. Ishiro
Honda, Tomoyuki
Tanaka, Akira
Ifukube, Takeo Kita, and Eiji
Tsuburaya all sound out the roll call
for the movie's production. Throw in a plot
set in the future, and add in an astounding
eleven monsters to the proceeding, and one
has what sounds to be a recipe for a memorable
and great entry in the series. Sadly, it doesn't
pan out that way. The film is memorable, that
much can be said, but it falters when it comes
to plot, pacing, and its characters, leaving
great music and special effects that alone
are not enough to elevate the overall production.
In terms of story, the year
is 1999 and most of Earth's monsters have
been contained on Monsterland on Ogasawara
Island. The island, and its faculty, are attacked,
though, by an extraterrestrial race called
the Kilaakian, who administer a mind control
over the humans and monsters alike. In short
order, a global siege is conducted using the
creatures as an attack force. The crew of
a spaceship called the Moonlight SY-3 swing
into action to investigate Monsterland, learning
of the intentions of the aliens. With their
ultimatum known, the aliens escalate their
attack on Japan. Eventually, after a conflict
on the moon with the Moonlight SY-3, the methods
of their mind control is discovered and the
Earth forces manage to take control of the
monsters for themselves. This leads to a final
battle at the base of Mount Fuji as the Kilaakian
unleash King Ghidorah against the Earth monsters.
The plot is one that features
a lot of great ideas, but lacks in terms of
execution. On the bright side, one has the
concept of Monsterland, which as Monster Island
would become a large force in pop culture
references. It's a nice idea too, one which
sadly is only introduced in the start of the
film before being quickly whisked away for
the alien conflict. In the end, that is the
main problem. The film is more or less a retread
of Invasion
of Astro-Monster (1965), utilizing
the same idea of monster control. It brings
new concepts to the table, such as the global
strike and a futuristic setting, but in the
end is never able to shake off the comparison
to the 1965 entry in the series. The aliens
here are also sub par. They lack the menace
and mysterious sense that the Xilien had,
instead feeling more like a means to the end
of an all out monster fest. The horrible thing,
though, is the lack of focus on their mind
control. The race manages to take over the
entire human populace of Monsterland. However,
the heroes have no problem gunning most of
them down, and the plot more or less treats
them like aliens rather than human beings
trapped in a regrettable situation, which
to add insult to injury is not even permanent
as seen by Kyoko Manabe being saved from the
alien's influence. This is particularly sad
as it would have been a great plot device
to focus on in order to separate it more from
the many other alien invasion flicks that
Toho has produced.
Pacing is another issue. The
film gets bogged down in its outer space side
plot, with the UNSC Moon Base seeming more
like an effort to make the movie seem more
futuristic rather than something that was
created with the intention of serving the
mostly Earth based plot. In the end, the film
is forced to spend too much time both explaining
Monsterland and the Moon Base, the former
of which is a much more interesting concept
yet the movie tends to favor exploring the
moon settings instead. Now, despite its flaws,
the movie does feature the very excellent
final showdown with King Ghidorah. This scene
is probably one of the greatest in any Godzilla
feature, and is really the movie's saving
grace. The monsters aren't utilized as effectively
as they could be, with only Godzilla, Anguirus,
and Gorosaurus allowed to fully interact with
King Ghidorah, but the sense of scope is still
present. Action sequences like Gorosaurus'
famous kick that brings down the space demon
are still things of legend. Sadly, the movie
commits the biggest mistake of all related
to this scene and pacing in general: it's
not the movie's climax. Instead, a conflict
with the Moonlight SY-3 and a Kilaakian UFO
is the final action piece here. The sin committed
by this is really unspeakable. It shows volumes
for how much the staff behind the production
was interested in the ship and space setting
in general, but even then it's hard to imagine
why someone would place any action scene after
the amazing group fight with King Ghidorah.
It causes the movie to just grind to a halt.
Rather than letting the audience soak in the
kaiju battle and then enjoy the closure, it
instead drags out a slow paced aerial dogfight
which due to being placed after the conflict
with King Ghidorah makes the whole proceeding
seem dull. In the end, Destroy All Monsters
is a text book example of how to make a movie
anti-climatic.
In terms of the characters,
they are completely forgettable. Katsuo Yamabe,
portrayed by Akira Kubo, takes the lead role
here. His role is more or less the generic
hero, and his character never does much to
stand out besides being one of action in all
situations. His rash thinking could have been
a nice element for his downfall or a classic
case of misjudgment, but nothing poetic of
the such is ever explored as he goes in, guns
blazing, in most situations and comes out
for the better in most of his conflicts. Kyoko
Manabe is Yamabe's girlfriend in the picture,
who is controlled through most of it by the
Kilaakian. She is never really developed,
though, primarily acting as the alien's cold
voiced spokesperson while under control and
then afterwards reverting to a very meek and
under spoken character. No effort is made
to develop her, one way or the other, in regards
to her being utilized by the Kilaakian and
her feelings toward that.
As for the acting, the performers
do little to breath life into the paper-thin
characters they are meant to inhabit. Akira
Kubo in particular is disappointing here.
He lacks the charm he had in roles such as
Son
of Godzilla (1967), left with his
more unsympathetic hero portrayal which does
not play to his strengths. Jun Tazaki plays
the doctor Yoshido here, a similar role to
the one he had in Invasion
of Astro-Monster (1965) but lacking
in regards to the more fatherly qualities
his character was allowed to portray in that
feature to make him more interesting. In the
end, Tazaki is serviceable, although unmemorable
in the role. Yukiko Kobayashi plays the mostly
mind controlled Manabe. Kobayashi, best known
for her excellent portrayal of the title character
in Vampire
Doll (1970) outside of this movie,
gets the most to work with here, and does
a good job of portraying the cold and emotionless
aspect of her character when controlled. The
night and day shift between when the character
is mind controlled and when acting of her
own free will is also made very clear. It's
unfortunate, though, that the character is
so dull when not being controlled and really
gives nothing for Kobayashi to work with.
Finally, rounding out the cast is Yoshio Tsuchiya
as the mind controlled doctor. Sadly, since
he already played an almost identical role
in Battle
in Outer Space (1959), this feels
like fairly uninspired casting. To be fair,
Tsuchiya is natural in the role, seeming distant
and slightly otherworldly while also doing
well to contrast from his character before
being bent to the alien's will.
To end on a positive note,
both the musical score and special effects
are top notch here. The score by Akira
Ifukube is a noticeable bright spot in
fact. It's slightly repetitive, as Ifukube
always is, but creates such memorable cues
as the main title and the battle music at
Mount Fuji that one can hardly complain that
themes appear again and again. The special
effects are also great. The new Anguirus suit,
if one can ignore the obvious crawling on
the knee aspect, is highly detailed and a
real stand out for the ones seen in the film.
The movie, as a whole, is much less uneven
than most entries in the Godzilla series too
in terms of the effect work. Aspects like
Gorosaurus destroying the Arc de Triomphe
are still to this day great to behold, although
it would have been nice to see Baragon correctly
placed in the role during the scene.
Overall, the movie has a few
things going for it. The final kaiju battle,
a great musical score, and the concept of
Monsterland save the production. In the end,
it's far from a bad entry in the series, but
is one undeserving of the amble amount of
praise many fans seem to give it due to the
cast behind it and the large monster roster
it has.
|
(2.5/5)