Godzilla vs. Gigan

Here's a review of Godzilla vs. Gigan, courtesy of my 11-year-old, Ian:

Godzilla vs. Gigan is a decent kaiju movie complete with giant monsters flailing around. In the movie, cockroaches invade earth using the alien dragon King Ghidorah, and the cyborg Gigan. Gigan has a chainsaw in his belly and resembles a chicken. Godzilla and his sidekick Anguirus come and save the day. The movie, however, is very cheap.

They keep using stock footage, so the scenes are always changing from night to day (I could see Larval Mothra for a split second in one scene). But, who cares? Not me. The action is great, but a major annoyance throughout the movie was the fact that the movie had soooooo much talking. It was annoying to have to constantly fast forward through all the talking in order to see the action. But, go ahead and rent it. Even if it is annoying to constantly fast forward or watch all the talking, it's still worth the giant monster fight scenes.

Attack of the Monsters

Attack of the Monsters, also knows as Gamera Vs. Guiron, is a late-‘60s giant Japanese monster (or kaiju) movie for kids.  It stars a gigantic, jet-powered flying turtle with really large tusks.  He fights a gigantic lizard-thing with a head shaped like a giant Buck knife and knees that clearly hadn’t been reinforced, because they start to tear in the film’s later stages.  It’s all great fun, with nice model scenery just waiting for destruction and monsters scary enough for an eleven-year-old yet fake enough for a two-year-old.

Here’s the story: Gamera (the turtle) rescues a couple of boys who explore a flying saucer that had touched down near their home (And really, what self-respecting boys wouldn’t?).  See, the saucer is a trap!  It’s remote controlled by evil, brain-eating aliens who look just like attractive Japanese women in shimmery silver leotards!  When the saucer takes off and flies to the Planet of Attractive Japanese Women in Shimmery Silver Leotards, Gamera pursues and does battle with Guiron, the aliens’ attack knife-lizard thing.  Meanwhile, the boys, brave and resourceful, must find a way to escape the clutches of the attractive Japanese women in shimmery silver leotards.  Stuff like this is what popcorn was made for, and my kids ate up every minute of it.

Me?  Well, I had a good time!  Attack of the Monsters so earnestly tried to entertain my kids that it charmed the heck out of me. The Gamera franchise occupies a pleasant sphere as Daiei Studios’ child-friendly answer to Toho Studios’ more teen-oriented Godzilla.  This outing’s aliens were just menacing enough, its sets and costumes just good enough, to help me suspend my disbelief and roll with it.  This isn’t half the movie that my next entry, The Earrings of Madame De… can boast of being.  But it isn’t trying to be.  It’s trying to be light entertainment for monster-hungry preadolescents, and it succeeds.  Attack of the Monsters is a winner.