Six years after "Godzilla," it was time for director Ishirô Honda to make a movie without a real monster, but instead to deal with the reality, that the only real monster on Earth, is the human race, and we do a pretty good job of it, too!! There actually was a giant walrus designed by the master Eiji Tsuburaya in this film, but it was of less than secondary nature and deleted from all but the Japanese versions of the film! 
"Gorath" is not a monster itself, but instead, an out of control runaway planet on a collision course with Earth!! Before the movie really gets going, the first crew is already subjected to an honorable but unnecessary death!
You gotta love the fact that someone thought they needed to translate "Hey!"
Cool entrance to "The Spaceport!" So, it's 1962 and in Japan, all they drive are American cars, boy, how times have changed!!
An actor Kan Ishii, who composed the score for this film was actually just a classical composer whose main gig was not film!! Now, I've done a bit a research, and so far I can't really find out what's going on with these guys singing these songs, first it's the crew of the helicopter, as it flies merrily along...........
And then again, in the club scene, it's my new favorite song, "Hey!!" I don't know what it is, but I really like that song, very spirited like some kind of allegiance to life, or maybe just to drinking! Who cares? How can you possibly resist a song that spunky?? It's all too surreal with off kilter vocals, a polkaesque beat and some very snappy horns! Damn, I wish it was longer!! Take what you can get!! At least they're dealing with the end of the world much better than the people in "Day The Earth Caught Fire!"
Uh-Oh, running out of time!!!
Hard to get a good shot of Magma, the giant walrus, but at least you can see kinda see how big he really was, in the background, as these guys run away!!
Eternity!! That's a wrap!! Today is Forrest J. Ackerman's 92nd Birthday!! Wow!! Happy Birthday Forry!!
they took out all the "Banzai!" for the American version, too...
ReplyDeleteno, i don't mean those miniature trees!
Tora Tora Tora!
ReplyDeleteYou left out the best part! When Earth realizes they can't blow up the star heading towards it or build enough spaceships to fly people to safety, they build giant upsidedown rockets in Antarctica and PUSH THE EARTH OUT OF THE WAY!
ReplyDeleteThe movie ends with scientists wondering how they are going to stop Earth's movement once its started since there are no continents in the Arctic to build braking rockets on!
Hey Buzz,
ReplyDeleteAlways good to get your input, cause we ain't no rocket surgeons, that's why we focus mainly on the music!