Not long ago I reviewed Gamera vs. Barugon, the second installment in Daiei Motion Picture Company's Godzilla rip-offs. Now I have watched the third film Gamera vs. Gaos, which answers once and for all what would happen if a giant radioactive turtle/spaceship fought a Rodan knockoff that shoots poorly animated sonic rays. The short answer is that the turtle wins, because this is his series after all. But before we reach that point we get to see scientists coming up with ridiculous plans to defeat the new monster, listen to the prattling of an annoying fat kid, and follow a subplot involving highway construction and greedy farmers that never goes anywhere or adds anything to the plot.
The acting is on the level of junior high school play, with most characters coming off as wooden or cartoonish. And there are all the requisite stock characters, including but not limited to: the hard nosed reporter investigating the controversy surrounding the highway construction, likely because it's a slow news day; the annoying kid who befriends Gamera and then shows up at every war council and gathering of experts whether there's any reason for him to or not; and the distinguished scientist, who looks oddly like Colonel Sanders and shares his crackpot theories.
Nor is the dialog any better. The dubbing sounds like it was done by a ten year old. Don't get me wrong, the dialog makes sense, and the translation even seems relatively accurate, but everyone has the vocabulary of a fourth grader. One example is the farmers' discussion of how they should impede the construction project. "We oughta wreck that site. Yeah, let's do that. Yeah, let's go." Every conversation in the movie sounds just like that, even when it's scientists and generals who are doing the talking. In the words of the head scientist, "We have to proceed with some theory, and right now this is the only one we have." My theory is that everyone in this movie is an idiot.
This theory is further supported by the utter lack of common sense displayed by everyone who appears on camera. For instance, if a giant monster was living in the side of a mountain above your town, would you evacuate? These villagers don't. And if you realized that said monster was venerable to sunlight, your first response would likely be to blast open the side of its cave and let a little sun in. But that would be too simple the geniuses in this film. Instead, they decide to build a giant rotating platform, on the premise that if they spin Gaos fast enough, he'll be too dizzy to fly away, and he'll be roasted when the sun comes up.
At this point you may be wondering, "Just how to you get a giant prehistoric flying reptile to stand on a rotating platform?" Simple, you put a giant fountain of blood in the center. I'm not sure if I should be grateful or uneasy that they never explain where the blood comes from.
This is not the only question never answered. This movie also left me pondering questions such as If a monster can fly, why would it allow itself to be dropped from great heights? What are the chances that Tokyo's largest stadium would be packed at midnight, despite the apparent absence of any game being played? And why, after Gaos is defeated and everyone gets their happy ending, do we get a random series of clips from earlier in the film and from previous films in the series? I'm not sure these questions have answers, but I am sure that the minds of people who wrote this script must be very colorful indeed.
The acting is on the level of junior high school play, with most characters coming off as wooden or cartoonish. And there are all the requisite stock characters, including but not limited to: the hard nosed reporter investigating the controversy surrounding the highway construction, likely because it's a slow news day; the annoying kid who befriends Gamera and then shows up at every war council and gathering of experts whether there's any reason for him to or not; and the distinguished scientist, who looks oddly like Colonel Sanders and shares his crackpot theories.
Nor is the dialog any better. The dubbing sounds like it was done by a ten year old. Don't get me wrong, the dialog makes sense, and the translation even seems relatively accurate, but everyone has the vocabulary of a fourth grader. One example is the farmers' discussion of how they should impede the construction project. "We oughta wreck that site. Yeah, let's do that. Yeah, let's go." Every conversation in the movie sounds just like that, even when it's scientists and generals who are doing the talking. In the words of the head scientist, "We have to proceed with some theory, and right now this is the only one we have." My theory is that everyone in this movie is an idiot.
This theory is further supported by the utter lack of common sense displayed by everyone who appears on camera. For instance, if a giant monster was living in the side of a mountain above your town, would you evacuate? These villagers don't. And if you realized that said monster was venerable to sunlight, your first response would likely be to blast open the side of its cave and let a little sun in. But that would be too simple the geniuses in this film. Instead, they decide to build a giant rotating platform, on the premise that if they spin Gaos fast enough, he'll be too dizzy to fly away, and he'll be roasted when the sun comes up.
At this point you may be wondering, "Just how to you get a giant prehistoric flying reptile to stand on a rotating platform?" Simple, you put a giant fountain of blood in the center. I'm not sure if I should be grateful or uneasy that they never explain where the blood comes from.
This is not the only question never answered. This movie also left me pondering questions such as If a monster can fly, why would it allow itself to be dropped from great heights? What are the chances that Tokyo's largest stadium would be packed at midnight, despite the apparent absence of any game being played? And why, after Gaos is defeated and everyone gets their happy ending, do we get a random series of clips from earlier in the film and from previous films in the series? I'm not sure these questions have answers, but I am sure that the minds of people who wrote this script must be very colorful indeed.