| Godzilla Versus Gigan Released: 1972 MPAA Rating: G Genre: Super Monster Nuts And Bolts: Aliens disguised as humans trying to take over the planet; space monsters wreaking havoc to do their bidding; Big green lizards charging forth to protect all mankind. You know…the usual. Summary: We’ll begin by introducing the first half of our four-person crew of intellectually bankrupt yet heroic personages. Gengo Kotaka and his girlfriend Tomoko Tomoe are cartoonists working for a division of the Children’s Land charity organization. The Children’s Land has built a large amusement park in Tokyo complete with games and Ferris wheels. The central tower of the business itself is in the shape of a 150-foot high plaster Godzilla. You see, the Japanese don’t really get bent out of shape when it comes to monsters destroying their city. As this movie proves, rather than provide counseling for those that may have survived a monster’s vicious attack, they instead build theme parks around them. Gengo keeps trying to sell his lame ass comic book ideas to his boss. He creates two cartoon characters known as Shukra, the Homework Monster and Mamagan – The Monster of strict mothers (Mamagan looks strangely a lot like Gengo’s girlfriend). The boss is not overly impressed with Gengo’s work and bullies him out of the building. As he leaves, he accidentally bumps into a young woman named Machiko Shima. Machiko is real nervous and runs off before she realizes that she has just dropped a reel of tape onto the ground. Gengo retrieves the tape and begins to take it to the penthouse offices of the Children’s Land charity. Gengo is truly a clumsy fuck, as he manages to bump into several people, knocks over a globe and trips over the steps to an upper landing. Before long, this idiot manages to dumb luck his way into the office of the foundation’s chairman Fumio Sudo. Gengo is surprised by Fumio’s youth, as well as the fact that he sits in this really cool looking space-age egg-shaped chair. Fumio is pretty up front about his business’s interests. He intends on bringing about world peace. His primary tool towards this end is something called the Nebula M space hunter orbit. Later that evening, Gengo is on his way home when he is accosted by Machiko and her overweight hippie friend Shosaku Takasugi. Machiko now realizes that Gengo has the data tape and Shosaku holds him up with a carefully concealed corncob. Believing the sloppy fuck to be holding a gun, Gengo faints. Machiko and Shosaku take Gengo into his house and revive him. Machiko tells Gengo about her brother Takashi Shima. Takashi is an engineer working at the Children’s Land. But Machiko believes that he is being forced to work for Chariman Fumio against his will. She believes that she may be able to blackmail for her brother’s release with the stolen tape. Gengo retrieves the tape from a post office safe deposit box and plays it for them. The tape only transmits a high pitched radio signal. However, the signal carries for several miles, all the way to Monster Island in fact. Now for those of you who don’t know, Monster Island is a preserve designed to contain all of the world’s most popular monsters. Godzilla and Anguirus hear the signal and actually begin TALKING to one another! They decide to roam on over to Tokyo to see what all the hubbub is about. Gengo decides to go back to Godzilla Tower to check out Machiko’s story. He finds a lighter belonging to her brother and is convinced that she is telling the truth. It never crosses his mind that Takashi Shima may be a legitimate employee of the charity. Returning to Machiko and Shosaku, the three decide to do some background checks on the executives running the Children’s Land. They track Fumio’s home address through City Hall and travel out there to investigate. They meet Fumio’s parents who explain to them that Fumio and his friend Kabota died over a year ago in a mountain climbing expedition. His mother even shows Gengo photographs of Fumio. So now Gengo is confused because he distinctly recalls seeing Fumio sitting in that badass looking space egg. Now about this time, Anguirus reaches Sagami Bay. The Japanese Defense Forces send out the mobile units to head the monster off. They fire several volleys of rockets at Anguirus. None of them do any damage, but they are enough to severely irritate Anguirus into leaving the bay altogether. Once again, Gengo returns to Godzilla Tower; this time in an effort to actually rescue Takashi. Kabota, secretary to the chairman finds him and escorts him out of the building. He gives Gengo a pack of cigarettes for no real apparent reason. Gengo returns home to report his failure, never even questioning why the suspicious mustached corporate officer is just giving cigarettes away. The filters of the cigarettes contain micro transmitters that allows Kabota to track him. Kabota and a bunch of goons follow Gengo back to his house and muscle him for the tape. Gengo’s girlfriend Tomoko pops in and briefly drops a few of the thugs with a couple of well-placed karate chops. But Kabota’s agents gain the upper hand when they bust out with the ultra-hip looking ray guns. Kabota retrieves the tape and returns back to the Godzilla Tower. Okay, enough of this boring-ass shit. Let’s get to the monsters. Kabota uses the tape to broadcast satellite signals that summon the alien monsters Ghidrah and Gigan from out of space. They can control the two aliens and are going to use them to wreak destruction on Earth. Now, this probably seems fairly devilish coming from a couple of blokes who want nothing more than to promote world peace right? Well, as you have probably guessed by now. The Chairman and his cronies have been a little less than honest with how they conduct business. You see, they are actually ALIENS from a planet of cockroaches! The cockroach people pretty ass-raped their own world of all possible use and those that survived had to jump ship in order to find a new planet that could help sustain them. So their goal is basically to make sure they can live in cockroach-lovin’ glory without any one fucking with them. Now by this point, you probably all know who Ghidrah is, but Gigan is a wholly new critter to the Godzillaverse. Gigan has a beak, one red eye and single talons in place of hands. Also, he has this weird nifty belly weapon. A row of spikes stick out from his gut and can spin about like a circular saw. Fortunately, for the citizens of Tokyo, Godzilla and Anguirus are on their way. Arriving on Earth, Ghidrah immediately begins soaring over the Tokyo skies blasting the shit out of buildings with his death rays. Gigan takes the slow methodical route by simply sawing through buildings with his gut spikes. As usual, the Japanese civil defense guys send out squads of plastic jeeps and tanks in the hopes of destroying the monsters. They know damn well that this tactic NEVER works, but I guess they have a surplus of range rovers in need of a good demolishing. So the little tanks edge along the streets towards the monsters and successfully accomplish ten pounds of fuck-all. Meanwhile, Godzilla and Anguirus are taking their good ole sweet fucking time dragging their fat asses over to Tokyo. This leaves Ghidrah and Gigan plenty of time to destroy buildings and blow up toy jeeps. The Air Force zooms in and begins firing missiles at Gigan. For some reason, they fly in really close, allowing Gigan the ability to knock them out of the sky with his goofy hand talons. Watching this, I realize now why we kicked so much ass against the Japanese at Midway in ’42. These guys suck! Seriously, how intelligent do you have to be to realize that you are in a fighter jet armed with missiles? You don’t NEED to swing in real close! You can just zip around and strafe the ugly green frog from any number of safe vantage points. But one by one, these dumb shits keep angling in real close, so Gigan can pick them off like little irritating dried up boogers. It’s a good thing the Japanese don’t rely entirely upon their military might. They got some hardcore monster power backing them up. Speaking of which, Godzilla and Anguirus FINALLY show up! Which is a good thing, because by now the small 2-minute clips of them floundering around in the Sea of Japan becomes really fucking annoying. First, Godzilla monkey-charges Ghidrah. Undeterred by the attack, Ghidrah blasts some oil refineries causing a wall of fire between Godzilla and he. Pretty smart plan all things considered. Gigan flies over the flames but wily ole Godzilla knocks him out of the sky with his radioactive breath. Distracted by Gigan, he doesn't see Ghidrah readying a blast to nail him from behind. After that, both Ghidrah and Gigan turn their attention towards slow-ass Anguirus. Realizing that he is the weaker link, they rightly believe that they can take him down pretty fast. They begin wailing on Anguirus but Godzilla gets his back by pelting Ghidrah with a bunch of rocks and shit. Gigan rips Godzilla’s right shoulder open spurting blood all over the place. He doubles back around and nails G-man two more times with the same attack. While all this is going on, Ghidrah puts a hurting on Anguirus. Meanwhile, Gengo and the others rig some rope to a hot air balloon and strap it to the upper windows of the Godzilla Tower allowing Takashi to break free and escape by sliding down the rope. Fumio and the rest of his carefully disguised cockroach horde mistakenly believe that the heroes are stealing one of their jeeps to escape. We learn that the big plaster Godzilla Tower has blue laser beams in the eyes. They blast the jeep, believing that they have killed Gengo and Takashi. While this is happening, Godzilla wanders off to re-gather his strength. Totally punch drunk from the wounds he received from Gigan, he believes the Godzilla Tower to be one of his foes and begins charging it. Fumio launches the Tower eye-beams at Godzilla and bowl him over. Gigan arrives to finish Godzilla off. Fortunately, Anguirus decides that he is tired of getting the shit stomped out of him by Ghidrah and decides to go help his bro, Godzilla. He selflessly dives in front of Gigan’s forward attack and catches the belly razor full in the face. Blood flies everywhere and Anguirus passes out from the pain of having his ugly face cleaved in two. Meanwhile, Fumio sends his cronies outside to make sure that the heroes have been killed. Now just when you thought this movie couldn’t get any dumber, the brainiacs at Toho Studios slap us in the ass with a brand new spanking paddle of cheese. Gengo and his posse in an act of desperation quickly sketch black and white likenesses of themselves and paste them onto the door of the power generator of the Godzilla Tower. I guess the cockroach critters only see in black and white because this dumbass trick actually works. Momentarily believing the drawings to be the real thing, they open fire with their cute plastic ray guns. The generator explodes, destroying the tower. The aliens convert back into their true bug forms and die screaming like little girls in flames and falling debris. Naturally, this releases Ghidrah and Gigan from the aliens’ control. Godzilla gets a second wind going and revs back up. He plows into Gigan full bore and pounds the shit out of him. Brave little Anguirus meanwhile actually thinks he can take on Ghidrah. Honestly, I’m impressed the spiky little turtle boy is even still alive. He chomps down on the back of Ghidrah’s tail (For all the good that does). Ghidrah grabs Anguirus and tosses him on his back. Sad really, as this seems to happen to Anguirus every time he gets into a fight. Fortunately, Godzilla is through beating the stuffing out of Gigan and lumbers over to help Anguirus out. Gigan tries to fly after him, but Godzilla ducks out of the way, forcing Gigan to fly straight into Ghidrah. Godzilla flips Anguirus back over and the two engage in a private huddle. Formulating a plan, they double team the evil monsters. Godzilla tosses Gigan away and then sneaks up behind Ghidrah and executes the Sleeper hold. With Ghidrah unable to move, Anguirus begins ramming him with his back spikes. Then Godzilla administers several belly-to-belly suplexes. Godzilla’s finishing move is always the good ole reliable head stomp. This is about the third time that Ghidrah has had his melon caved in by Godzilla’s skanky feet. Tired, confused, and feeling less than fresh, Ghidrah and Gigan decide to literally tuck their tails between their legs and skip out of town. They fly off into space to go lick their wounds. Pussies. They’re mission completed, Godzilla and Anguirus decide to slog on back to Monster Island. Gengo and the others are happier than maggots on a shit pile and gleefully wave goodbye to the triumphant monsters. Godzilla stops and turns and WAVES back at them!!! Acting / Dialogue: Do I really need to even address this? How many Godzilla reviews must be read before everyone realizes that the acting in this movie sucks? I’m so used to this crappy Japanese dubbing by this point, that it doesn’t even faze me. Gore: Godzilla gets his shoulder tore open and blood goes flying everywhere. Also Anguirus is looking pretty hurtin’ when Gigan’s saw blades cleave his face open. Guilty Pleasures: Okay, this movie has one distinction that sets it apart from all other Godzilla movies. And it is that Godzilla and Anguirus actually TALK! No I don’t mean they grunt and growl at one another. I mean they actually fricking speak English! On top of that, these little cartoon word balloons appear over their head translating the dialogue into Japanese. The first time I watched them do this back on Monster Island, I knew that what I was watching was going to be something special; a movie for the ages. Scroll down to GREAT LINES for the inside scoop on what monsters say to one another. The Good: When one thinks of horror movies, they think of sitting alone in the dark with the blankets pulled up to their chin while the wind and rain pounds the outside windows and the only illumination inside the creaking house is the brilliance of the television screen horrifying us with images of a dirty masked stalker flaying the tender white flesh off of a puerile teenagers face. They almost certainly don’t think of overweight Japanese stuntmen climbing into a cheap rubber suit and bouncing around a valley of fake trees and plastic mountains on a studio set while some over-caffeinated director screams action queues at them. That being said, Godzilla versus Gigan is not the type of movie one watches alone in the dark. Not because its too scary, but because its too silly. This is the type of flick you watch on a rainy Saturday afternoon with your pals while your pop mows the lawn and your alcoholic mother nurses her fifth gin and tonic, while thinking of ways to get the family out for the evening so she can pork the pool boy. Don’t turn a blind eye towards this gem just because it contains more cheese than your uncle’s underwear. This flick is just a waterfall of fun, fun, fun. Firstly, we got some cool cameos in the beginning. When Godzilla is first shown hopping up and down furiously on Monster Island, we also get guest appearances by a few lesser-known critters such as: Mothra, Rodan, Titanosaurus, Spidera and Minya. Most of these plastic clowns won’t be seen again until Destroy All Monsters, but there’s enough of them hear to give the fans a slightly squishy feeling of satisfaction in their drawers. Then there are the fight sequences. At first, they start off kind of slow, with the monsters squaring off and prostrating themselves before each other. They growl and flail their little flipper arms in much the same way that professional wrestlers lay the verbal smackdown to one another before climbing into the ring. But once the nostrils start flaring, the action becomes pretty tight. The pyrotechnics used in the explosions are actually pretty decent. They are a helluva lot better than the standard puffs of smoke that we usually find in these flicks. Many buildings get blown up, and there are fires raging all throughout Tokyo. Very nice indeed. Also, this movie gets bonus points from me, because it features the three-headed badass of all three-headed baddasses, Ghidrah. Ghidrah is shown to be a bit smarter than he has been in previous incarnations. He is careful to keep his distance from Godzilla, throwing up roadblocks at every stage and concentrating his efforts on Anguirus while Gigan wears the big man down. It’s a pretty sound plan really. After all, my fat aunt Sally with the wooden leg could probably kick Anguirus’ ass. After getting rid of him, it should be simplicity itself to tag-team with Gigan to destroy Godzilla. But Godzilla is after-all the hero of this little donnybrook, so ultimately he has to win. It’s okay though. Ghidrah makes a pretty smooth showing, even though he does flee like a bitch towards the end. I’m not sure what to think of Gigan. On one hand, I think he’s a cool addition to the ever-growing rogue’s gallery of monsters. But at the same time, the logic of the whirring blade stomach just completely escapes me. No real back story is given for him either. He pretty much just appears alongside Ghidrah. Now while Gigan will probably never be anyone’s favorite monster, he does show up again the following year in Godzilla Versus Megalon. Now even though the story is pretty much garbage, it has the advantage of not taking itself too seriously. And for that, I am grateful. There is nothing worse than watching a Godzilla movie and being made to feel intellectually inferior, because we did not become one with the great dramatic allegory being presented before us. Screw that! No one should be made to feel dumb for watching a Godzilla movie. Fortunately, this flick is so fucking goofy, that everyone who watches it walks away feeling superior to those involved in the making of it. And anything that helps to enhance my already burgeoning superiority complex is A-OK in my book. The Bad: Okay, so Godzilla is chilling out with his monster buds on Monster Island when his danger sense goes off. So who does he choose as a tag-team partner? Anguirus! And this begs the question, why? As we learned from Gigantis the Fire Monster, Godzilla and Anguirus are mortal enemies. (Yes, I know. He was called Angilus in that movie, and Godzilla was called Gigantis. It’s still the same bloody monster however. Stop nitpicking). So when did these two become buds? Furthermore, of all the sweet ass monsters you could choose from that Island, why would you stick with the most useless one of them all? Every time Anguirus tries to cause some damage, he gets rolled over onto his back and becomes a giant-sized paper weight. EVERY DAMN TIME! He sucks. He’s got no cool laser beams or wings or ANYTHING! His only weapons are his back spikes, and he has to launch himself ass over elbows if he ever wants to use them. I’m thinking that if Godzilla had maybe taken Rodan or even Minya with him on this journey, he wouldn’t have gotten his ass kicked so much. Furthermore, I am sick to death of these flicks using the exact same plot for every goddamn film. Just like all the other Godzilla movies, the script centers around a group of Japanese looking aliens who enslave a couple of monsters in order to take over the world. You would think that by now, the people of Japan would be so paranoid that they would be murdering their own mother in their sleep for fear of them being a dreaded alien cockroach spy. Give it a rest Toho! This story was played out before you even did it the first time. For the life of me, I really can’t comprehend why I, a grown man, consistently engage in this nonsense. I mean…as much as I may like to fool myself, these movies are crap! Genuine dung-beetle infested crap! Maybe it’s some sad attempt to recapture my childhood. But then, I have to seriously ask myself: was my childhood really that pathetic? When other kids were out scoring crack and trying to finger the hot early developer from across the street, I was at home watching Godzilla movies and trying to tear the fabric costume off of my Mego Wonder Woman action figure just so I could see if they painted any hair pie on her nether regions. I can’t call to mind a single lesson taught to me from grades K-12 but I can remember every stupid stink-fisted rubber monster that Godzilla has ever thrown down with. This is about as pathetic as pathetic comes. Thanks to the Internet however, I have come to learn that I am not alone. Not only that, but I am not even the worst of the lot. For in that intervening time, I have since learned of the pleasures of the opposite sex, the splendor of malt liquor and the rapture that comes with discovering competitive auto insurance rates. Sadly, many of my contemporaries will never know these riches. Which is just fine for me, since those guys are the most likely ones to visit a website such as this. So for all of you who feel that they wasted their precious youth on endless hours of idiocy such as Godzilla Versus Gigan, don’t feel bad. You’re not alone. Many of us have fallen prey to the ills of 70’s cinema, and in a sublime and somewhat satisfyingly twisted sort of a way we’ve grown stronger because of it. Great Lines: "You're a hard bitch!" – Gengo playfully chiding his girlfriend Tomoko. "You cheeky pig!" – Tomoko ripping on Gengo. "Hey Anguirus!” “What do you want?” “Something funny going on. You better check.” “Okay.” “Hurry up!" "Anguirus, come on. There's a lot of trouble ahead.” “Okay!" –The actual spoken exchange between Godzilla and Anguirus. Overall Rating: Four out of ten severed heads. |
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