Two years after establishing the modern Japanese monster movie in GOJIRA/’54 (Stateside revamp GODZILLA out in ’56), founding-father/on-going master of the form Ishirô Honda added color & pop design elements to his arsenal, moving past post-WWII disillusion and ditching men in monster suits to create a new species of city destroying horrors. And what starts as an inspection of flooded mining operations finds not man at fault, but giant, killer caterpillars to blame before metamorphisizing into flying beasts of chaos. The police are helpless; army bullets ineffective; rockets & bombs might cause earthquakes & eruptions. Yikes! But maybe just the thing to bring down these pterodactyl-like agents of destruction. Director Honda paces this all expertly, laying out surprisingly detailed victims, scientists and local heros. Piling on Tinker-Toy urban destruction and model monsters that might have come out of a breakfast cereal box, reinvigorating the imagination of playing with that old Erector Set you thought you had lost or long outgrown. Knowing when to push ahead and when to linger, Honda will always spot that great shot of a city in ruins (miniatures & cyclorama painting) while in the foreground commercial neon signs come to life. And if his lava flows like warm butterscotch pudding and urban destruction is scored by jolly military march music, it’s all part & parcel of these apocalyptic memory-making classics.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: Can’t deal with low-tech monsters or men in Godzilla suits? Honda’s also at his best with the human-devouring, shape-shifting ooze of THE H-MAN/’58. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-h-man-bijo-to-ekitai-ningen-1958.html
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