Gorgo

 

 (wikipedia)

GORGO-1961-Two guys Ryan (Bill Travers; later in BORN FREE) & Slade (William Sylvester; later in DEVIL DOLL) heading a cargo ship discover a prehistoric lizard monster off the Irish coast. They bring it back to London where promoter Dorkin (Martin Benson) exhibits him/it. Some scientists determine that Gorgo is not full grown and a parent could be on the prowl. Sure enough Mama comes looking for her baby, destroying most of London in the process (including Big Ben). 

There's basically no women in this movie! 

Director Eugene Lourie was no stranger to giant monster having directed both THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS and THE GIANT BEHEMOTH. Interesting UK production with an unusual ending.

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The One and Only

 

 (imdb)

THE GOLDEN BAT (Ogon batto)-1966-Akira (Wataru Yamagawa), a young guy who likes astronomy tells some scientists in an observatory that the planet Icarus is going to collide with the Earth. They don't believe him. He's contacted by a secret organization hidden in "the Japan Alps", who monitor abnormalities on Earth, to help destroy Icarus before it strikes Earth. Unbeknownst to them is that Nazo (Koji Sekiyama), an evil alien who sort of resembles a muppet rabbit has send Icarus at the Earth. Meanwhile a “super destruction beam cannon” is developed by Dr. Yamatone (Shinichi “Sonny” Chiba) and Prof. Pearl (Andrew Hughes; also in DESTROY ALL MONSTERS). When one of the organization's ships mysteriously disappears the group all put on shiny suits (including Pearl's young granddaughter) and board super car #2 to investigate an uncharted island which turns out to be a submerged portion of Atlantis. . 

When they are attacked by Nazo's alien henchmen the group hides in a cave where they discover a sarcophagus of "The Golden Bat". When they pour water on his stomach he comes to life and proclaims himself "the protector of justice". He vanquishes the attacking aliens and helps the group escape. When Nazo finds out about the super destruction beam cannon he sends disfigured Keloid (Yoichi Numata), female Piranha (Keiko Kuni) and wolf like Jackal (Keiichi Kitagawa) to destroy it. They invade the organization headquarters and The Golden Bat, who has a skull face, a cape and a baton and laughs just as maniacally as bad guy Nazo, shows up to help but Prof. Pearl is kidnapped and the cannon stolen. Piranha takes over the body of Noami, one of the crew. Later Keloid is transformed into Pearl. GB invades the base and takes back the beam just in time to destroy Icarus before it hits. 

The Ogon Batto character was created in 1931 and is now generally considered the first comic book superhero. He kind of reminded me of Dr. Phibes! Although an Anime series was produced in 1967, this is the only feature film made featuring the character. Director Hajime Sato later made GOKE, BODY SNATCHER FROM HELL.

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Mr. BIG is 100!

 It was director Bert I. Gordon's 100 birthday a couple of days ago. Let's celebrate!

EARTH VS. THE SPIDER-1958-A small town has a spider problem. Two teenagers Mike (Gene Persson) & Carol (June Kenny) searching for the girl's father (Merritt Stone) stumble into a cave where a giant spider is nesting. They escape and warn the sheriff (Gene Roth) who scoffs. A school professor Art Kingman (Ed Kemmer) convinces the sheriff the threat might be real. A whole group goes out to the cave. They find Carol's dad's corpse and the giant spider. They think they kill it with DDT and Kingman convinces the sheriff to bring it back to the school to be studied. It's locked away in the gym but Hugo the janitor (Hank Patterson) allows bass playing Sam's (Skip Young) rocking combo to rehearse there and their swinging rock & roll brings the creature back to life! It wrecks the town endangering everyone including Kingman's wife (Sally Fraser) and their kid. Stupidly Mike and Carol go back to the cave to look for her lost bracelet. Unfortunately the spider heads back there. They get lost and the town plans to dynamite the cave. 

Mike's dad Mr. Simpson (Hal Torey) owns a movie theater that's showing THE AMAZING COLOSSAL MAN & ATTACK OF THE PUPPET PEOPLE both directed by SPIDER's director Mr. BIG himself Bert I. Gordon. There's also a scene of a teenager reading “Famous Monsters Of Filmland” number 1! 

The strange part of this story (forgetting that there's a normal sized spider blown up to look gigantic on the screen) is that Kemmer's character of Kingman is really responsible for all the the destruction and death. Co-screenwriter Lazlo Gorog also penned THE MOLE PEOPLE. George Worthington Yates, the other screenwriter scripted several other Mr. BIG movies and THEM!

Thnaks for reading and thanks to Mr. BIG. Hope you had a nice day!

Yongary

  (imdb)

YONGARY, MONSTER FROM THE DEEP-1967-After some stuff about a scientist being called back to work from his honeymoon and an astronaut coming back from space, Korea is threatened by a massive earthquake which turns out to be the legendary giant reptile Yongary until now thought to be a myth. It crashes through the countryside while a group of scientists and the army try to stop it with the help (?) of Iro, a young boy who at one point dances with the giant! This is an entertaining giant monster movie directed by Ki-Duk Kim.

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Yet Another Yeti

 (wikipedia)

YETI: GIANT OF THE 20TH CENTURY-1977-Prof. Wasserman (John Stacy) discovers a giant Yeti in Canada on an expedition funded by big mouth Morgan Hunnicutt (Eddy Faye). Along with his assistant Cliff (Tony Kendall, nee Luciano Stella) and Hunicutt's grand-kids Jane and Herbie, he brings the monster back and revives it. The creature immediately escapes and causes havoc, capturing the kids. They eventually bond with the big hairy dude (Mimmo Crao) over some fish. Canada goes media crazy for The Yeti but when the big galoot is brought before its adoring fans, flash bulbs upset it. It wrecks an elevator Jane is on but saves her and the two hide out in upstate NY. Crowd reaction panic looks are funny. The Yeti seems to be dying but Wasserman saves it. Unfortunately when two of Morgan's thugs kill Wasserman and make it look like Yeti did it the big guy escapes with revenge on its mind. In the end Jane pleas for the poor creature to go away work (hey, the Yeti didn't ask to come to the modern world) and it returns to the frozen north.... presumably to get refrozen? Herbie's dog turns up alive. 

Donald O'Brien (DR. BUTCHER MD) is head of the police in the climax. This Italian production, filmed in Canada was directed by Gianfranco Parolini who also directed the “Kommissar X” series starring Kendall.

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Harryhausen Beast

 

THE BEAST FROM 20,000 FATHOMS-1953-In the Arctic, Prof. Tom Nesbitt (Paul Hubschmid aka Paul Christian) & Colonel John Evans (Kenneth Tobey) await the arrival of a plane as part of "Operation Experiment", an atomic explosion. While checking for radiation Nesbitt and his pal Prof. Ritchie (Ross Elliot) run into a giant dinosaur which causes an avalanche. Nesbitt is rescued. 

Of course Evans and his doctor (Frank Ferguson) and a psychiatrist (King Donovan) don't believe him. After the monster sinks a ship and Nesbitt reads about it he hightails it to NYC to convince Prof. Elson (Cecil Kellaway) to organize an expedition. His assistant Lee (Paula Raymond) tries to be helpful but to no avail. Eventually Nesbitt convinces Elson the monster exists and asks Evans to help. He in turn asks his Coast Guard friend (Donald Woods) for assistance and finds out the monster wrecked a lighthouse in Maine. When Edson goes down in a diving bell he encounters the monster confirming its existence. Unfortunately he's killed and the monster attacks Manhattan. 

People flee in terror, buildings are wrecked, cars are crushed and in the movie's most famous scene a cop is lifted by his head and eaten. It's also discovered that the beast is carrying deadly germs. Nesbitt says shooting it with a radioactive isotope is the only way to kill it. He and an army sharpshooter (Lee Van Cleef) wind up on a roller coaster in a Coney Island like setting to destroy the beast. 

BEAST was one of the biggest money making films for 1953. Eugene Lourie does a fine job directing and there's lots of familiar characters throughout but of course what really makes this film is the excellent stop motion animated giant monster created by the one and only Ray Harryhausen. His painstaking effects are incredible! Based in part on a short story by Ray Bradbury.

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Clone-Zilla

 

AGON THE ATOMIC DRAGON-A giant dyno-lizard terrorizes the coast of Japan, stomping trees, buildings, an atomic reactor and a lighthouse. It's attracted to uranium. A reporter (Shinji Hirota), a government agent (Asao Matsumoto), a scientist (Nobuhiko Shima) and his female assistant (Akemi Sawa) try to stop it. This four part Japanese TV series was shot in black and white but tinted in sepia given it a very odd quality. It's a pretty cheap production but with much more than a passing resemblance to Godzilla. At one point Toho prevented it from being shown but later relented.

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