Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Review: Son of Godzilla (1967)

Where to begin... Godzilla himself looks like a saggy mutant hippo with one enormous fat neck that's bigger than his actual head. It's by far the worst of the suits. Couldn't they just reuse an old one? The giant praying mantises are actually pretty well done as is the spider Kumonga (though the fact they're his only enemies is ridiculous), and I actually like the scenes between father and son, but overall, this film is extremely disappointing. It's nothing compared to the masterpiece of the original or my personal favorite, Godzilla 1985. All the sets and everything look so cheap, which I'm sure they were. And besides the big guy's laughably bad appearance, any sense of danger from him is gone as well. There's no king of the monsters here. Obviously, this was aimed at kids, and it shows. It's a complete 180 from the atomic nightmare Godzilla was supposed to represent. No cities are destroyed. Godzilla couldn't even stay in shape for this one. God, that suit looks awful. My eyes are crying out for help. Did they want him to be deformed? What the hell happened? Did he finally let himself go? Jeez, that's one of the worst things I've ever seen. Wake me when it's over.

2 comments:

  1. I always thought that Manila looked more like grey lumpy mash, but still this movie seems like a work of art, when you compare it to the abismal "Godzilla's Revenge".
    Alas the little bugger would become a blight on the series and even when someone has a gun (Godzilla:Final Wars") they still fail to snuff him out.

    Still this is my wife's favourite film in the series, as she's one of those people who thought that Manila was cute.

    Cool blog

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  2. Thanks.

    Yeah, "Godzilla's Revenge" is by far the worst in the series. That's the one I was thinking of. Not that "Son of Godzilla" is really much better, but you're right. Compared to the other, it's Picasso. I think my brain has tried to systematically wipe out all memories of his son because of the damage done by "Revenge."

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