KING KONG VS. GODZILLA and KING KONG ESCAPES: A GIGANTIC DUO OF CLASSIC TOHO FILM REVIEWS BY SANDRA HARRIS. ©
KING KONG VS. GODZILLA: 1963. DIRECTED BY ISHIRO HONDA. STARRING ICHIRO ARISHIMA. PRODUCTION COMPANY: TOHO CO. LTD.
KING KONG ESCAPES: 1968. DIRECTED BY ISHIRO HONDA. STARRING RHODES REASON, LINDA MILLER, AKIRA TAKARADA, EISEI AMAMOTO AND MIE HAMA. PRODUCTION COMPANY: TOHO CO. LTD./RANKIN BASS.
I enjoyed this double helping of Toho film gems immensely. For those who don't know, Toho Co. Ltd. is the name given to the Japanese film, theatre production and distribution company responsible for producing and distributing the films of Akira Kurosawa and the animé films of Studio Ghibli, to name just a fraction of the things they've done. I recently watched and reviewed Akira Kurosawa's 1985 masterpiece 'RAN' and I can tell you with confidence that being associated with his work is no mean achievement. Ditto the beautiful animated Studio Ghibli films.
Godzilla is Toho's most famous creation. Wouldn't you just love to be able to take credit for such a gargantuan accomplishment? That's a great word, gargantuan, meaning enormous. I'll almost certainly be using it again during this double review of movies featuring two of the biggest, fiercest monsters the cinema screen has ever seen: KING KONG and GODZILLA. Ooooh-er, missus...!
KING KONG VS. GODZILLA does exactly what it says on the tin. It features the giant ape who carried Fay Wray to the top of the Empire State Building in possibly the biggest monster movie of all time, KING KONG (1933). He's seen squaring off against the giant Japanese lizard who, along with Mothra, Rodan, Mechagodzilla and King Ghidorah, have been described as Toho's Big Five because of the number of times they've featured in the production company's films.
King Kong is captured yet again in this film, believe it or not, this time by a rich businessman who thinks that a giant monster will send his TV ratings through the roof. Carl Denham wanted Kong for the big screen, now crazy old Mr. Tako wants to splash his hairy mug across the small one. Seems like everyone's determined to get Kong into showbiz, haha. Not every ape's cut out for that kind of life, you know!
When Kong reaches Japan, he meets Godzilla, newly released from the iceberg where he's been trapped since God-knows-when. (God, or God-zilla...? You see what I did there?) When Kong arrives, Godzilla just so happens to be taking a wander around his country of origin with a view to stomping on a few buildings and lumbering painfully into the power lines which it's hoped will kill him. The battle between the two monsters is hilarious.
I watched both these films with my son, a well-brought-up young fella. While he and I both know that it's not nice to snigger at someone being kicked in the nuts, we couldn't help laughing our heads off when Godzilla did this very thing to Kong and Kong bellowed in pain and rage before falling on his ass and rolling backwards down a hill. The Battle of the Beasts is epic, awesome and very, very funny. Miss it at your peril. I italicised 'peril' to increase the sense of urgency, heh-heh-heh.
There are more laughs (and megalomaniacs!) in store in KING KONG ESCAPES. An evil genius who's called Dr. Who- I kid you not!- builds a robot version of Kong (Mechani-Kong, if you please!) to do some heavy digging at the North Pole for a radioactive element known as Element X.
Crazy old Dr. Who, who's almost certainly not been going for his dental check-ups, decides to kidnap the real Kong when Robo-Kong falls down on the job. This time, at least, Kong's being abducted for the purposes of hard labour as opposed to being groomed for the phoney-baloney, ass-kissing, back-stabbing world of showbusiness. He's gotta be happy about that, surely. Not...!
The funniest thing about this film is that the gargantuan Kong (there's that big word again!) spends the whole time being completely pussy-whipped by a little blonde submarine nurse called Susan. She can control him just by talking to him loudly in the English which is clearly his first language, haha. Ah well. I'm sure it's not the first time a big dumb hunk of a male's had his head turned by a flash of white ankle and a hank of golden hair...!
The climb up Tokyo Tower during the face-off between Kong and his robotic counterpart at the end of the film is totally reminiscent of Kong and Ann Darrow's adventure in the 1933 film. Mie Hama does a great job as the sexy Madame Piranha (what a brilliant name!) whose unsuccessful attempt to seduce the handsome Submarine Commander Carl Nelson will probably raise a giggle or two from the viewers.
Actually, both these films totally reminded me to dig out my old FU MANCHU films, starring Christopher Lee. Now, there was an evil genius! Fu Manchu, I mean, not the late great Christopher Lee. He may have played his share of villains in his time but according to all sources he was basically a good egg, haha.
The creatures (giant apes, lizards, snakes and dinosaurs) are hammy and homemade-looking and you can kind of see their zippers at the back of them but I wouldn't hold that against them for an instant. Their rough-around-the-edges appearance only makes them all the more endearing and loveable, just as the bad, frequently mis-timed dubbing just adds to the tremendous fun of the films.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY OF SANDRA HARRIS.
Sandra Harris is a Dublin-based novelist, film blogger and movie reviewer. She has studied Creative Writing and Film-Making. She has published a number of e-books on the following topics: horror film reviews, multi-genre film reviews, womens' fiction, erotic fiction, erotic horror fiction and erotic poetry. Several new books are currently in the pipeline. You can browse or buy any of Sandra's books by following the link below straight to her Amazon Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B015GDE5RO
You can contact Sandra at:
http://sandrafirstruleoffilmclubharris.wordpress.com
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