Gezora, Ganime, Kameba: Kessen! Nankai no Daikaiju

Yog: Monster from Space
Yog: The Space Amoeba / Supesu Amiba / Aliens: Monster des Grauens greifen an

Japan 1970
produced by
Tomoyuki Tanaka (executive), Fumio Tanaka (executive) for Toho
directed by Ishiro Honda
starring Akira Kubo, Atsuko Takahashi, Yukiko Kobayashi, Kenji Sahara, Yoshio Tsuchiya, Yu Fujiki, Noritake Saito, Yuko Sugihara, Sachio Sakai, Chotaro Togin, Wataru Omae, Tetsu Nakamura, Yukihiko Gondo, Shigeo Kato, Rinsaku Ogata, Haruo Nakajima
written by Ei Ogawa, music by Akira Ifukube, special effects by Teisho Arikawa

review by
Mike Haberfelner

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A spaceprobe headed for Jupiter is taken over by bodyless aliens and directed back to earth, where it lands near a small Pacific island.

At around the same time, at the request of a big hotel chain, photographer Kudo (Akira Kubo), Doctor Mida (Yoshio Tsuchiya), and Ayako (Atsuko Takahashi) come to the island to see if it can be opened up for tourism. Unfortunately, Obata (Kenji Sahara), a spy from a rival company, has somehow managed to come with them ... but that's the least of their problems it soon turns out when a giant octopus, Gezora, attacks the island, which is especially problematic because this octopus can get up on its hindlegs (hey, do octopusses even have hindlegs ?), leave the water and wreak havok on land. Only eventually can our heroic trio drive the octopus back into the water using fire ... but that doesn't end their problems by a long shot, because soon enough, a giant crustacean and a giant whatever (I really have no idea, it might be a turtle, it might be a lizard, it might be - well it is - just a man in a monstersuit) attack as well. Eventually, Kudo, Mida and Ayako figure these creatures must all be possessed by some extraterrestrial intelligence that was brought home by the space probe, and that they can only be defeated using ultrasonic noise ... and thus they have to use bats to fight the monsters. Good thing the island has quite a few caves that house bats, bad thing that Obata is by now also possessed by the alien intelligence and he burns the bats in their caves to cinder. However, when he is about to burn the last cave of bats as well as all the others, Ayako makes a plea to his humanity, and eventually good wins over evil in Obata and he releases the bats on the crustacean and the whatever, who suddenly engage in mortal combat and before long fall into the local volcano. Obata, realizing that he is the last hope for these nasty aliens, leaps into the volcano as well, and the world is once more a safe place ...

In his time, director Inoshiro Honda has made a handful of quite fine science fiction/monster movies, the original Godzilla springs to mind, and Mothra and Matango - Yog: Monster from Space however is a film more likely to hurt his reputation, the plot is about as overused as it is trashy, the special effects are sloppily done and lack any really exciting scenes of destruction, and the monster suits are nothing short of ridiculous - I mean, why would you make an octopus walk on its hindlegs ?

Sure, the film is still good for a few laughs - but I have laughed much better elsewhere.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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