Japanese Title: "Kingu Kongu Tai Gojira"
Rated: not rated
Released: August 11, 1962 (Japan)
June 3, 1963 (U.S.)
Length: 98 min. (Japan)
91 min. (U.S.)
Cast: Tadao Takashima (as Osamu Sakurai), Kenji Sahara (as Kazuo Fujita), Yu Fujiki (as Kinsaburo Furue), Ichiro Arishima (as Mr. Taco), Mie Hama (as Fumiko Sakurai)
Gojira Movie Number: 3
"Mmmmmm, No more!!! I am sick of Godzilla!" This quote from Mr. Tako sums up my feelings for these films. Actually, Godzilla is fun to watch, just not constantly. (That is why Taco says such an outlandish thing.) Not only is it fun to watch, but it’s probably my favorite Godzilla film.
This is the first Godzilla film I’ve ever seen. It’s got lots of very funny scenes in it. Most of these scenes are made funny by the stupid faces and very bad dubbing of the actors. It’s always funny to see fake island natives speaking in a made-up language. It’s even funnier to watch the Japanese try to look like Africans. The best island "black" man is the translator, Kono. He makes the dumbest looking faces and acts like Barney Fife.
Well, enough of that. We’ll get back to this movies faults later. For now, we’ll get into the story. To begin, we see our planet spinning and we hear an odd quote that seems out of place. Then we get taken to a news room with our intrepid reporter, Eric Carter. He seems to enjoy telling us about the weather of Japan. One has to wonder why a U.S. reporter would care. But this doesn’t stop Carter. He goes on to tell us about ocean currents and a sub that’s been sent to investigate the breaking up of ice. Wow!
Eric Carter hasn’t quite told us everything he knows. He decides to show us some ultra large berries which look like giant super balls. They certainly don’t look appetizing. But then he tells us that it has a non-habit forming narcotic effect. Whoa!
Onto the sub. This has many dumb lines spoken by the captain and his men. For some reason, their equipment is so lousy that they end up running into an iceberg. An earthquake occurs right about now and the sub is rocked as pieces of ice fall on it. (Note: in really cold places, the laws of physics no longer apply...thus, ice sinks and hits the sub rather than floating.) Then one hears an annoying sounding train whistle and all of a sudden, the sub bursts into flames. But not before it releases some emergency ink to help the rescuers find the sub.
There’s a scene in the movie that foreshadows what is to come. We get to hear about sewing thread that’s "stronger than steel." It’s Fujita’s wire and he’s decided to show it to Sakurai, a new reporter who’s going to Faro island in search of more of those narcotic berries. Of course, to demonstrate the wire’s strength, Fujita walks over to a window and climbs out. Then, by spreading his arms out and stretching the wire taught, he can lean backwards and not fall. It doesn’t matter that the wire isn’t tied to anything. He also happens to lasso something off screen so that he can "swing like Tarzan."
Soon thereafter, we watch a chopper come looking for the downed sub. The pilot tries to talk to his co-pilot, but the guy never says anything back. Is he deaf? Anyway, they watch Godzilla break out of the iceberg that the sub had run into.
"The world is stunned to discover prehistoric monsters still exist in the 20th century," intones star reporter, Eric Carter. Apparently, the last time Godzilla and Anguirus appeared has been completely forgotten. I guess the fact the Godzilla was buried in ice in the last movie and appears in an iceberg in this one has no connection whatsoever.
Now we zip off to Faro island where we watch Sakurai, Goro (another reporter), and their translator, Kono. Here we watch some incredibly funny faces and hear some laughable lines as Kono tries to get the chief to let them stay on the island. They convince the chief with their "magic" radio and some cigarettes ("inhale, inhale!"). This scene would make the Marlboro man proud! In fact, they give a child two cigarettes after exclaiming, "Your mommy!" And something like, ‘don’t smoke that at home.’
A little thunder ruins the party though. It’s angry gods! The natives go into bowing mode and Goro gets agitated as their guide keeps saying "big spirit". Eventually, we hear a roar and Goro tells Sakurai, "That thunder ain’t thunder!"
Back in the news room, we find that Carter has found a scientist with the brains of an eggplant. For no reason whatsoever, Dr. Johnson tells us that, "as a reptile he (Godzilla) might shy away from electricity." The doctor also speculates that Godzilla is a cross between a tyrannosaurus rex and a stegosaurus. Where does he gain this knowledge seeing as the world has never seen these animals before!? The world may never know!
In Faro, we discover our heroes trekking into the island in search of the monkey god, Kong. We listen as Goro tells us about his psychic corns. When they hurt, something bad will happen. And sure enough, he trips and lands on a giant rubber lizard. For some reason he picks it up and swings it about his head while screaming something like "get it off, get it off!!!!" Then he tosses it off a cliff. Amazingly, this must not kill it because Sakurai immediately shoots it. Then there’s an avalanche and Kong’s roar.
We stay in Faro so we can watch a little boy moon us as he attempts to get some berry juice. Unfortunately, that must be a no-no, as his mom comes looking for him. Soon they’re both in a hut full of juice. But these two are very unlucky, as a giant octopus is hungry and it left the ocean so it could get the juice. The other natives try to save them, but their spears seem to hit an invisible wall. Even the torches can’t get through its force field. After watching some lousy SFX as a tentacle grabs a guy, we are greeted to a site of Kong. He comes out and fights the beast. It looks like the octopus is squished, but it survives and crawls away, even though giant boulders are hurled at it by Kong. Of course, the boulders just bounce right off of the invisible bluescreen wall! We also discover that Kong is an accomplished ventriloquist. He can roar quite will with his mouth completely closed!!!
Now Kong must drink juice. He is soon looking very dumb. In fact, he’s obviously drunk. This gets the natives excited! They must make music to their god! Thus, we get to enjoy some other island chicks get "jiggy" for Kong. And of course, they all wear nice coconut cups. Ooh, aah!
This is where Kong is captured by the reporters. Their boss, Taco had sent them there for that purpose. Later on, in the middle of the ocean, Kong awakes and escapes.
Back to Dr. Johnson. This time we learn that Godzilla’s brain must be the size of a marble while Kong (the drunkard) has a brain that’s ten times larger than a monkey’s skull!! He goes on to say that "being instinctive rivals, they’ll (Kong and Gojira) try to destroy each other." Why would a giant ape and a fire- breathing lizard be rivals? It’s obvious! Kong is a god, but doesn’t have that as part of his name. Godzilla, isn’t a god, but is called a god every time someone utters his name. Thus, Kong is jealous of Godzilla’s name! That’s it! I’ve solved the puzzle!
Soon, Kong is fighting Godzilla. This is where we learn that Kong’s arms change sizes. They seem to vary between human length and gorilla-ish length. Anyway, Godzilla gives Kong some heat and he quickly backs off. This makes Taco (the news reporter’s boss) exclaim "ooh, that Kong! He’s chicken!"
The army comes up with a trap that would make Team Rocket proud. They dig a huge hole for Godzilla to fall in! The only difference between this trap and one of Team Rocket’s it that the Japanese army had their hole lined with dynamite that they exploded once Godzilla was in it. This doesn’t even faze Godzilla, so they fall back on plan B. That is, to surround Tokyo with high tension wires that have one million volts of electricity flowing through them.
We segue to Dr. Johnson at this point to learn that Kong draws strength from electricity. How does he know this? Obviously Jane Goodall’s studies on simians hadn’t happened yet, but even so, you wouldn’t think that a doctor would be that stupid!!! Oh well…
Thus we find Kong happily breaking through the wires. In fact, he stops to chew on them. Then he’s off to get a Japanese Fay Wray from a speeding train. This nice girl happens to be Sakurai’s sister Fumiko. To free the girl, Sakurai tells the Japanese general that they ought to shoot some berry juice at Kong, thus putting him in a drunken state. Taco shows his brilliance by eloquently stating: "Ha! King Kong can’t make a monkey out of us!" Then Sakurai gets his drums (which he carries everywhere with him) out and plays them along with a recording of the island native’s chant. Who knows how he recorded this when they were singing seeing as he’d just gotten done trying to waste bullets on the octopus. Oh well…
Anyway, once Kong’s asleep and the babe is free, they use Fujita’s wire is used to tie Kong to some balloons. Then they float him off to do battle with Godzilla. This is the BIG fight. Godzilla gives Kong the business. He toasts him repeatedly and Kong shows just how smart he is when he tosses a rock at Godzilla while going into a roll and smashing his head into a rock. Thus, Kong is knocked out. Wow! It’s a good thing his brain is so big otherwise Godzilla wouldn’t stand a chance!!!!!
Unfortunately, Kong wakes up briefly and tries to continue battling, but he is quickly knocked back out by Godzilla’s mighty tail. Then Godzilla tries to cremate Kong, but as luck would have it, and electrical storm occurs and lightning is attracted to a motionless giant sleeping on the ground. This revives Kong and the battle continues.
We get to see a brief sequence of stop motion or puppetry here in which Kong gets knocked on his butt when Godzilla leans back on his tail and gives him the boot! It’s quite funny looking, in an odd sort of way.
Another odd thing that happens is that Kong is cheered for by the brother and boy friend of the girl that Kong had taken. What’s up with that!?
To end it all, Kong and Godzilla take a dive into the ocean and in this one instance Godzilla "drowns." Well, he disappears completely anyway.
I think this movie is cool. It’s got lots and lots of funny stuff in it. However, the dubbing is terrible and there are so many inconsistencies that it can get confusing at times. At least there isn’t much swearing. A couple of other noteworthy things you ought to know are:
I give it:
