Giganten der Vorzeit

Taking the formula established by the success of Jaws and combining it with the domestic kaiju film, Legend of Dinosaurs and Monster Birds had a decent amount of potential but ultimately shot itself right in the explosive tank before it could fully realise that. The DNA of the film feels ripped right from Nessie, the tragically cancelled collaboration between Toho and Hammer, with climate anomalies and seismic activity reviving prehistoric reptiles to terrorise the residents around a legendarily monster-haunted lake. One of those creatures is a Plesiosaurus with the film even referring to poor Nessie at a few points during its runtime, Toei was evidently listening at the walls of Toho studios one summer day. Director Junji Kurata seems to have failed to fundamentally grasp the premise of a huge monster operating by stealth and picking off its victims individually in secret, regardless, his direction is nonetheless passable. The film doesn't allow you to bond with the characters, there's little reason to care for them beyond their base archetypes, however, the actors all turn in decent performances at least. The ill-fitting and often hilariously juxtaposed music by Masao Yagi is usually the film's talking point, combining a catchy mixture of disco, funk, and jazz. Despite a healthy dosing of gory violence and some great effects work, Legend of Dinosaurs and Monster Birds is a really outlandish film, odd and sometimes surreal, it's at least capable of keeping your interest from beginning to end.

Vacationers at Saiko Lake at the foot of Mt. Fuji are terrorised by aquatic and flying primeval monsters. The inaptly titled film (technically there are no "dinosaurs" and certainty there are no "monster birds") has little going for it beyond camp entertainment. The titular creatures don't appear until around the halfway point, subjecting waiting viewers to some limp attempts at building tension undermined by juvenile comic relief, lengthy musical interludes (featuring Japanese rockabilly), and a 'false alarm' scene copied almost verbatim from 'Jaws'. Things pick up a bit when the snaggle-toothed monsters appear and film turns surprisingly grisly. Also surprising is the brief glimpse of nudity before one showering victim is devoured (apparently both the more egregious gore and the nude scene is frequently edited out). The creatures might have been eye-catching in the early 1960s but for a late 1970s horror flic, the models and miniatures are unimpressive. The score is a strange mix of funk that would be at home in a Blaxploitation cop movie, generic disco-jive, the aforementioned 'Japa-billy', and an amusingly inappropriate romantic ballad accompanying the scene where the heroine is dangling over a lava-filled crevasse. The version I watched on-line was adequately dubbed in English but also included grammar-challenged voice-recognition subtitles ("pliesosaur" is rendered "policía soar" at one point). Of interest to hard-core kaiju fans and perhaps to camp followers (the latter may prefer the MST3K version although they likely won't get to see the bum of the chum). Another hard-earned checkmark on my tokusatsu life-list.

This is regarded as the worst kaiju eiga ever made. I believe people always have a right to their opinions but this is vastly underrated. This film, about an obsessed paleontologist(dubbed by Robotech's Greg Snegoff) who comes back to his home town in search of a plesiosaur living in the lake. A pteranodon also makes an appearance as they duke it out at the end of the movie. There is graphic violence in this film but it's used quite effectively in quick cuts sending a jolt to the viewer. Most notably is when we catch a glimpse of a girl's bloody thrown-up arm and a headless horse. The music by Masao Yagi is of the times but is often effective and very original. It's unheard of for any monster movie to have a stylish jazzy film score. The pre-credit sequence is eerie. The cinematography is atmospheric, showing the misty forests of the lake and MT.Fuji. I admit this is a bad movie, but one that should looked closer on artistic terms. However, the movie has some obvious logic missing. Why would the reappearnce of dinosaurs cause massive earthquakes? Why would the ever so dormant MT. Fuji erupt after such a long time? How could anything hatch from a petrified egg?Also, plesiosaurs and pteranodons ARE NOT dinosaurs. The best scene in the movie is when the ptreanodon attacks some villagers. The editing is top notch and the disco-esque music that plays over it adds to the fun. The most disturbing part of the scene is when the winged reptile picks up a victim, flies high into the air and sadistically drops him. The dubbing is also very good. If you're a fan of Kaiju Eiga or b-films, pick this up.

I saw this back in the late 80s on the USA Network (when it was still in its weird, still-trying-to-find-an-identity-among-all-the-other-basic-cable-channels days) on an edition of the sorely missed "Commander USA's Groovy Movies." My dad taped this movie from that show (like he did with many Godzilla and Gamera movies on that ancient, crappy VCR we had in the 80s). I think he regretted it for some time afterwards, b/c my mom was not happy.

Basically, this is probably one of the most violent kaijus ever made, and even though I'm not easily shocked, I watched that ancient tape again the other day, and was surprised how violent this movie is, and how graphic the violence is. It's also fairly unoriginal, as it's merely one of many Godzilla knockoffs, made cheaply to make a quick buck.

Still, if you want to watch a cheap kaiju knockoff with shock violence, it's worth hunting down a copy. I don't know if I'd let kids watch this, even though I saw it when I was 6 or 7 years old, I don't know if I'd let a kid that young watch it.

I originally saw this movie when I was five years old. It was aired on a USA network creature feature. The movie fascinated me. My father taped the movie using our crappy 80's VHS player. I watched the movie throughout the next ten years until the actual tape broke from strain.

I'm not quite sure what it is exactly that makes me so incredibly addicted to this film. The soundtrack is a awesome 70's jap-pop funk. The dinosaurs, a pleasiasaur and some pterodactyl variant, are so rubber campy they're great. The acting is absolutely some of the worst acting ever committed to film, and that's including high school musicals and Congo.

I thought that i would never see this film again after my tape broke, but two years ago I found dude on the internet selling DVDs of the original Japanese print with English subtitles.