Atoragon, el supersubmarino atómico

This is a great kaiju movie from Toho Studios. Right off the beginning of this film, we see an already intriguing scene when a scientist gets kidnapped by a creature from under the sea. The suspense builds when the creatures reveal themselves to be habitants of the Undersea Kingdom of Mu, and that they have come to Earth to reclaim its land (of course the Earth people do not accept that, so it's the super-submarine Atragon to the rescue). The scenes where it show the origin and the places of the Mu Kingdom are very entertaining. We actually get to see what the Mu Kingdom looks like. The scene where the Mu people sing and dance and worship is a real charmer. For this movie, the special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya are spectacular and the screenplay by Shinichi Sekizawa is exciting, spellbinding, and full of suspense and drama. The plot is solid and perfect and Ishiro Honda's directing is superb. The music by Akira Ifukube is excellent and fantastic. The main title music is full of melody and harmony and is probably my favorite Akira Ifukube music score. And, virtually everybody is in this movie: Tadao Takashima, Yoko Fujiyama, Yu Fujiki, Ken Uehara, Jun Tazaki, Kenji Sahara, Hiroshi Koizumi, Yoshifumi Tajima, Akihiko Hirata, Eisei Amamoto, and Susumu Fujita.

The scenes where the Earth humans and the Mu people battle each other is inspiring. Manda, the giant sea serpent, is an awesome-looking monster. He is the protector of the Mu Kingdom. From the sounds of the worships, Manda seemed to be a powerful creature. However, he is actually pretty weak since he hardly put up a descent battle with Atragon, and he appeared only briefly throughout the entire movie. That was a disappointment - more scenes of Manda would have made this an even better feature. But overall, this film is a great one from Toho.

Grade B+

This is one of the better non-Godzilla films from the minds of Honda, Tanaka, Tsubaraya and Ifukube. Even though this film pretty much covers the same ground as they did in the Mysterians (even using some stock footage from that film), it still was a great film. The special effect's work by Tsubaraya has to rank as some of his best and the story is better than average for this type of film. I loved how they pretty much showed how tortured Jinguji was as he was torn between his loyalty to Japan, his love for his daughter and the needs of the world as they were being attacked by the Mu Empire. Also, in an interesting bit of casting, Akihiko Hirata and Kenji Sahara play villains instead of their normal heroic roles. It also was interesting that the threat to Earth in this film didn't come outer space but from beneath the ocean by one of the most legendary lost civilizations after Atlantis. This is definitely a great film.

There's something about this film that I can't help but like.

Everything is just one step beyond plausible. The bad guys have all sorts of powers that are used once and then never used again. The flying submarine Atragon has been built completely in secret by an Japanese Navy unit, in self-imposed exile, that is preparing to win World War 2 for Japan in 1963! There's a giant pet serpent that attacks the submarine. An entire city is destroyed in a way I won't describe but is completely wacky.

Silly and lots of fun. The special effects go from great to cheap to unbelievably weird. The movie is slow at points but when the sub finally takes off, it's non-stop action. You'll recognize the actors from many of the Godzilla films.

I remember seeing this movie as a preteen-ager at a drive-in in the early-mid 1960's. I watched it again years later on DVD and still found it entertaining. I would consider it a Japanese retelling of 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea.

An eccentric ultra-patriotic World War II Japanese naval genius has built a super sub in secret to restore the glory of the World War II Japanese Empire. However a new enemy has now emerged; an aggressive underwater kingdom called Mu and it's giant monster god.

This is a good movie with a decent plot and some very attractive Japanese women! The bikini shot of Akemi Kita early in the movie definitely wins the award for "The Best Bikini in a Japanese Movie". The Captain's daughter and the Mu Empress definitely rate a 9+ on the "hotness" scale as well. ;)

This movie is classic TOHO made during the heyday of Japanese science fiction. Although the special effects doesn't stand up to today's standards, for it's time they were above average. I remember watching this movie as a kid and being mesmerized by it. The musical score is very good as well.

The American release DVD quality is excellent. It is dubbed in English and about 89 minutes long. The colors are rich and vibrant. A very good presentation for this very good movie.

Definitely worth a look. I recommend it.

The evil empire of Mu had sunk to the depths of the Pacific around 10,000 B.C., but, as the 1963 Japanese film "Atragon" shows us, by the year 1965 its people were alive and well, surviving on the ocean floor and ready to conquer the surface lands once again. After Hong Kong and Venice are destroyed, it seems that only the supersub Atragon might be able to save the nations of Earth from the Mu menace, and so a team is dispatched to locate its renegade Capt. Jinguji, a superpatriot for whom World War II has never ended.... Anyway, "Atragon" is a very fine example of a "tokusatsu" (Japanese special FX movie), and the ship itself, with its drilling bow, cold-air cannon and ability to fly through the air, is quite a pleasing creation. The film reunites director Ishiro Honda, composer Akira Ifukube and FX master Eiji Tsuburaya from 1954's "Gojira," the original Godzilla picture, as well as that earlier film's Akihiko Hirata, the inventor of the Oxygen Destroyer, here playing Mu Agent #23. "Atragon" also dishes out some impressive-looking sets (such as those gigantic royal chambers in Mu) and rousing battle sequences (the Mu sub, with its serpent-shaped cannon, destroying a Japanese fleet, looks especially awesome). Although not a "kaiju eiga" (monster movie), the film still offers us one "daikaiju" (giant monster) in the form of Manda, a snaky serpent creature that gives the folks on the Atragon a rough moment or two. The picture packs quite a bit of story--perhaps too much story--into its 96-minute running time and probably would have benefited from an extra half hour for a more leisurely exposition. Still, the film is undeniably fun, and the Mu empress really is something to see. The DVD that I just watched, by the way, from Media Blasters' Tokyo Shock series, looks very fine, and really is everything one could ask for.