In the future of 1999, the world is at peace, with all the giant monsters imprisoned on the island known as Monsterland. But that's all about to end because a race of evil female aliens suddenly pitches up and frees them and using mind control then gets them to go around stomping all the major world capital cities! Well, here's a Japanese monster movie that has a great concept! Forget one, two or even three giant monsters, why not make a film with eleven! To that end, this sucker features Godzilla, his moronic kid brother Minya, giant caterpillar Mothra, three-headed alien creature King Ghidorah, the giant spider Spiega, the dinosaurs Anguirus, Baragon and Gorosaurus, the giant snake Manda, and the flying reptiles Rodan and Varan. Its ostensibly regarded as the 9th Godzilla film but with that much talent, this is clearly more of a team effort.
Early on we enjoy several of the big hitters taking the various towns - Rodan flies into maul Moscow, Mothra derails a train in Peking, Baragon takes down the Arc de Triumph in Paris and Godzilla emerges from the Hudson and demolishes the UN building. Of course, the action inevitably soon switches to Tokyo with various monsters, including Manda, getting in on the city smashing act. After all this fun, the entertainment does sag a bit in the middle, when the monsters take a back seat and the humans and aliens battle each other on the moon. But not to worry, the big guys return in style in a massive team effort, climatic final battle, where King Ghidorah comes down from outer space and fights all the other monsters. This sequence was notable to me for doing something I had never seen before - have a villain out-numbered by the good guys! And he is well and truly leathered by the lot of them, aside from Minya who does nothing useful in the entire film, except appear mildly brain damaged. Needless to say, this whole finale is absolutely brilliant fun and, as the saying goes, worth the price of admission alone. The special effects and model work are especially great in this whole sequence. Top quality entertainment overall.
Early on we enjoy several of the big hitters taking the various towns - Rodan flies into maul Moscow, Mothra derails a train in Peking, Baragon takes down the Arc de Triumph in Paris and Godzilla emerges from the Hudson and demolishes the UN building. Of course, the action inevitably soon switches to Tokyo with various monsters, including Manda, getting in on the city smashing act. After all this fun, the entertainment does sag a bit in the middle, when the monsters take a back seat and the humans and aliens battle each other on the moon. But not to worry, the big guys return in style in a massive team effort, climatic final battle, where King Ghidorah comes down from outer space and fights all the other monsters. This sequence was notable to me for doing something I had never seen before - have a villain out-numbered by the good guys! And he is well and truly leathered by the lot of them, aside from Minya who does nothing useful in the entire film, except appear mildly brain damaged. Needless to say, this whole finale is absolutely brilliant fun and, as the saying goes, worth the price of admission alone. The special effects and model work are especially great in this whole sequence. Top quality entertainment overall.