Il mostro invincibile

The veering of the Gamera series towards the younger generation began with the fourth film, "Gamera vs. Viras" released a speedy three years after the original hit Japanese theaters in 1965. Even though the previous movie, the gleefully entertaining "Gamera vs. Gyaos" was also geared mostly toward children, it still had an element of terror and dread in it. That is gone here and "Gamera vs. Viras" is an unsuccessfully endeavor. However, that it is hardly due to the fact that it is being directed at little children and those who are still able to find the child deep within themselves (a la moi). The problem with this picture is, despite its wonderful beginning and wonderful ending, most of the middle is just shameless, lazy jigsaw-construction of its predecessors. In other words, it's mostly just stock footage reels.

The opening is very promising. A spaceship venturing for a conquest of Earth is interrupted by Gamera, now fully evolved into the friend of all children. Before the vessel is destroyed, it sends a signal back to its home world and a second one is dispatched. Upon the new one's arrival, the aliens use their technology to determine Gamera's weaknesses and take two boy scouts (Toru Takatsuka & Carl Craig) hostage. Now implicating a mind-control device, they use Gamera to destroy civilization. The thin plot becomes thinner before it ultimately leads up to the titular conflict between the giant terrapin and a slimy extra-terrestrial cephalopod.

The movie is so wonderful at first. Both Gamera and the two boys are very entertaining. The latter are portrayed as witty, audacious, and thoughtful individuals...despite the occasional prank or two. And a scene involving them inside of a submersible racing Gamera underwater brought a smile to my face. But the movie starts crippling itself at the moment where the aliens start searching Gamera's past. It's stock footage from the previous movies, each reel lasting roughly five minutes. The aliens quote that their process takes fifteen minutes and it literally does. There's hardly any narration or trimming of the stock footage; it's just reused. (Frighteningly enough, for the U.S. version, the stock footage reel was increased to a mind-numbing twenty-five minutes!) When this ends, there is some relief, but then it becomes just more reused footage from the previous movies. Sequence upon sequence. And most jarring of all is when they decide to once again show Gamera attacking Tokyo as he did in the original film "Gamera the Giant Monster." Now if you will recall, that movie was black-and-white. This one is in color. Eyes squinting yet? Colorization was not around at the time this picture was made and yes, they still integrate colorless footage into a color movie! Just a slight bluish tint, that's all. And sadly, this drags on and on seemingly without end and wore me out. All of a sudden, even the whim and charm of Mr. Takatsuka and Mr. Craig, both of whom are very good in the film, seems unimportant.

Now the movie does pick up a little when the final battle does arrive. And it's satiatingly lengthy, but even with that, by the time it was all over, "Gamera vs. Viras" had exhausted me and left me feeling a thirst for a lot more. The stock footage it so abundant that if there had been more, it could have been a "Best of Gamera" show instead of a continuation to the series. And as far as I am concerned, a low budget should not be an excuse for ham-handed filmmaking. There are some good things here, including a leading performance by that wonderful actor Kojiro Hongo (who was in the previous two Gamera movies and would later play a small part in Shusuke Kaneko's marvelous "Gamera: Guardian of the Universe" almost thirty years later) but there are also a lot of bad things here too.

Viras has to be one of the best monsters that the Japanese ever created. I'm hoping and praying that Daiei Studios brings him back if they ever make another Gamera movie. A gigantic space squid with a cool looking face, creepy yellow eyes, and who's roar sounds like screeching metal just simply rocks! The problem with this movie however(next to the fact that two kids are the main stars) is that it's padded with huge amounts of stock footage. We get to see Gamera's origin and attack on Tokyo (in black and white!!) and his early fights with Barugon and Gyoas all from the first three Gamera films! This ruins the overall movie. But next to that it's pretty fun. A spaceship that looks like it's made with 5 black and yellow striped ping-pong balls, Viras decapitating his useless subordinates, and the giant Viras bloodily impaling Gamera with his sharp pointy head are the standout scenes in this flick.

Viras (a sort of space squid) and a shipful of aliens who dress like surgeons attempt to take over the Earth, two Boy Scouts at a time. Along comes Gamera... Suddenly, the movie grinds to a halt: we're treated to ELEVEN MINUTES of miscellaneous footage from the first three Gamera movies. Once the movie gets going again, we find Viras has implanted a mind-control device in Gamera's neck. He sends our hero turtle off to wreak havoc. This time we get to see even MORE footage from the previous movies: the dam attack scene from "Gamera vs. Barugon" and -- here's the kicker -- black and white footage from the original "Gamera", spliced in with no concern for continuity. The rest of the movie features some astonishingly gruesome images, including disembodied floating arms and Gamera getting impaled on Viras' pointy head. Basically, it's a cheap, cheap thrill for eleven-year-olds and immature adults like me.

Gamera steps in repeatedly to stop evil aliens from taking over the Earth. Frustrated but still determined, the aliens search for a weakness in Gamera's armor finally deciding to use Gamera's fondness for children against him. Capturing two boy scouts Gamera had recently befriended and threatening to kill them unless Gamera follows their commands, the aliens succeed in implanting a mind control device into Gamera. Now they threaten to have Gamera wreck havoc and destruction upon the world unless humanity bows to their demands. And if their plot involving Gamera doesn't work out, the aliens have yet another monstrous surprise all their own named Viras at their disposal.

While I quite enjoy that portion of the film that actually features new footage of Gamera and Viras in action, a third of this movie seems to be made up of stock footage from previous Gamera films and the way the footage is used is disappointing, one action sequence after another after yet another to the point it really grinds the movie to an halt. It's really too bad as the alien footage features some neat albeit shocking images much more gruesome than is usual for this type of kids' movies and the final battle with Viras just has to be seen to be believed. All in all, this is good fun that should appeal to those young and young at heart but still, that third featuring stock footage is tough slugging.

No one goes into the old Gamera movies expecting brilliance. In fact, most watch them fairly openly to delve into the schlock, whether as a guilty pleasure or to enjoy mocking it. I am somewhere in the middle of these two. I have a massive high tolerance for "badness", especially when it is done in the spirit of earnest fun, but there was a couple of times where I just wanted to shut this one off.

The first reason was the flashbacks to which many viewers allude. Not only is there a roughly fifteen minute scene composed of much too large chunks of "fight" scenes from earlier movies, but there are at least two "major" scenes that are taken from the first and second movie and then played off as freshly happening. It is so poorly done, that the scenes from the first one are left in black and white, despite the rest of this movie being in color! The second reason was the utter illogic of this one, in places. A genius kid is one thing, if almost always annoying at times, but this one went above and beyond. Not only is the kid allowed to tamper with various things with almost no repercussion, but him and his friend are given far too much freedom in the middle half of the movie. It is almost like this is a kid's happy dream, as opposed to an abduction by a vindictive life force.

And the climatic decision...egads! All in all, I stuck with it, and finally just started laughing out loud at it machinations. The final scene has some really good moments, as well, including some really well staged smashes and jabs. I give it a solid five stars, I enjoyed it once my brain switched over into its mode of handling things.