Fin du monde: Nostradamus an 2000

Nostrodamusu no Daiyogen was released originally in 1974 and subsequently banned in its homeland due to two scenes graphically depicting the aftermath of radiation exposure. The Japanese censors thought that the two scenes were far to reminiscent of the Hiroshima bombing to be seen by the public at large. Toho has since disowned the title, which has never been legitimately released in its original and unaltered form.

Catastrophe 1999, the international version of the film, was played in Europe and elsewhere. The film was cut from 114 minutes to 85, mostly removing important characterization scenes and the heartfelt speech of the Japanese Prime Minister that occurs in the final minutes of the film. This cut is still available on VHS in some European nations, but is hard to come by.

In the 1980's, Harry Saperstein (responsible for the US television releases of films like War of the Gargantuas and Frankenstein Conquers the World) got a hold of a print and butchered it into a cut several minutes longer than the international version (88 minutes) but lacking even more of the important scenes in the film. The original introduction was recut beyond repair, most of the references to Nostradamus and his prophecies were removed, and a makeshift ending was tacked on that minced scenes from the original Japanese ending and other parts of the film together. Paramount released a VHS and laserdisc of this version under the title The Last Days of Planet Earth and it is still played on television occassionally.

Thankfully for fans of Japanese cinema, someone located an unadulterated timecoded print of the film and has since made the original 114 minute version available, albeit only in Japan. I managed to snare a copy through an import service. The differences are astounding. Gone is the choppy editing of the international and US versions of the film, vanished is the dubbing, and what's left is one of the finest Japanese disaster films of all time. I can say for a fact that those of you who have only seen the Last Days of Planet Earth or Catastrophe 1999 prints of the film have, in fact, not seen the film at all. Judging the film by watching these butchered versions is not only difficult, but nearly impossible.

I encourage anyone with interest in the film to locate a copy of the 114 minute cut. It may not be for everyone, but those that even slighly enjoyed either of the cut versions are sure to find infinitely more to enjoy in the original Japanese version.

I would like to add my voice to those pointing out the contrast between the original long Japanese version and the shortened American version. It is not just a question of length. They are two different movies.

The Japanese version is balanced, thoughtful (believe it or not) and even has some subtle moments. It also leaves room for hope. There is something working in this that is very much lacking in the gargantuan excesses, overcharged adrenalin and endless CGraphics of recent Hollywood disaster indulgences.

The American version teeters between silliness and extreme depression. The dated effects and miniatures might turn you away but if you accept those and watch it through, it hammers away with hopeless imagery. As stark and as semi-cartoonish as the images might be, they are clearly recognizable as being rooted in aspects of the real world or its possibilities. If one is looking for a film to motivate a suicide pact to finally be put into action, this is it.

Very strange Toho produced militant film against pollution threats, directed by Toshio Masuda (Tora Tora Tora and Space Battleship Yamato), and quoting Tsutomu Ben Goto's interpretative book of the Centuries written by the Renaissance French astrologer Michel de Nostredame. The film, dealing with the various anxieties of the Japanese society, mingles all kinds of movie styles, from sentimental drama, adventure and mondo documentary, to catastrophe, apocalyptic, monster and even zombie ones.

The doctor Nishiyama (Tetsuro Tanba, Under the Flag of the Rising Sun) belongs to a family always persecuted for their belief in the reality of the prophecies of Nostradamus, as his grandfather killed by the samourais he has warned against the shaking of the coming Meiji Era, or his father imprisoned by the army for alerting them of the inevitable defeat. During these seventies, Nishiyama has now to fight against the new threat towards Japan caused by a multiple pollution which could even poison the very existence of mankind, while the voice of Kyoko Kishida (Woman in the Dunes) intones Nostradamus's dreadful warnings.

We go from one shocking scene to another showing all the disasters of a polluted environment: gibberellin used to artificially grow vegetables but which should have severe secondary effects on health, AF2 food conservative which has been proven toxic, thalidomide which causes horrible children malformations, cadmium, mercure and PCB "poisoning our oceans filled with the cries of dying fishes" like in Minamata, "chemical exposure on population" resulting in dramatic "increase in cancer patients", LSD which brings epidemic of hallucinations where people go crazy, and the madness of an arms race which, through "a local conflict which escalates in global war", could lead, as prophesied in a millenium fear for 1999, to "the fall from the sky of a great king of terror" such as a nuclear bombing. The film uses also the impact of fantastic scenes with big mutant slugs, overwhelming vegetation invading train tunnels, and children developing prodigious but fatal capacities after drinking zinc polluted waters, echoing bitterly with doping issues.

Nishiyama is helped in his campaign against pollution by the cameraman Akira (Toshio Kurosawa, The Human Revolution, from the same), who is in love with Nishiyama's daughter Mariko (Kaoru Yumi, ESPY). But could lovers still achieve their life in a such degraded context? During this time, Nishiyama's wife Nobuo (Yoko Tsukasa, Samurai Rebellion) is dying due to respiratory disease caused by benzopyrene athmospheric industrial emission.

A new threat has even been spotted by the United Nations in Papua New Guinea, land indeed of the weirdest possible, where strange radioactive clouds have gathered. As a scientific expedition sent to study the phenomena has disappeared, Nishiyama goes with Akira to rescue them. They are welcomed in Port Moresby by doctor Wilson (Franz Gruber, Submersion of Japan), and after the traditional journey by plane, jeep and walk through the jungle, they have to confront a nature monstrously changed, and of course even cannibals but irradiated ones.

Fearing that what happens in the most remote area could happen also everywhere, Nishiyama, in the way of the degrowth approach of the Club of Rome, appeals to the Prime Minister (So Yamamura, Tokyo Story) to take the right decisions to protect people and bring back to them confidence and hope, and stop "the race towards self destruction", allowing thus Japan and the whole world to "overcome the present crisis".

As the Nostradamus's prophecies themselves appear finally here like a mere illustration of the subject, the film does hold a prophetic side while dealing with issues wich are still very effective. It shows for example the explosion of the Fukushima nuclear reactor, because "no plant can be entirely safe from earthquake", and "when it comes to nuclear power, there can be no safeguard". The film also shows urban riots, panic scenes on roads and supermarkets, food supply and starvation issue through the question of massive cereal feeding of livestock, ecological care about "complex ecosystems which provide with beauty and clean air to breath so that we can continue to survive", a collapsology approach with the evocation of "an earth littered with the ruins of ancient civilization that had yet achieved advanced levels", noxious ultraviolet rays through the ozone layer depleted by nitric oxide, "drastic changes in weather devastating the world through droughts or deluges", great fires and floodings, and even melting of the pole ices, but here paradoxically related to a cooling of the athmosphere through polluted particles in the air, for global warming hadn't been yet properly theorized.

The humanist message carried through the film is, if people could get rid of carelessness, despair or selfishness, that everyone could make its own part, for "as long as we try there will always be hope", to "change the course of history for the better" and allow the world to stay sustainable for the future of "our children's children". (Viewed in Japanese 1h54 version.)

Depending on which version you see, it's either an epic masterwork or, a truncated mess. Originally, the film was a 1974 follow-up to the highly successful SUBMERSION OF JAPAN(1973). By this time, revenues for Godzilla had been falling and Toho saw more money in the disaster film genre. PROPHECIES OF NOSTRADAMUS was the next great, epic they did. The original cut is quite long and details the events that lead to world destruction by nuclear weapons. They had to work some monsters in there so what we get are giant slugs(about a foot or two long) and, giant bats(looked about four feet across). Details the story of a family in Japan-a 1970's polluted country-and how the excesses of pollution, famine and finally, war, effect them. Ostensibly, it's a loose remake of THE LAST WAR from 1961, by Toho. It even features stock footage from that film. There are some quite remarkable effects-a convexed reflection in the sky, of Tokyo thanks to a polluted and sweltering greenhouse effect which has occurred. A terrific matte painting of snow covered pyramids. And, later, a nuclear-blasted landscape of earth wit two VERY weird mutants scurrying for food. It was quite epic for it's time and a long film.

In 1983 or thereabouts, Henry G Saperstein's company UPA(which had under it's belt five Godzilla films and some other Toho works) acquired the film and edited it down to a scant 90 minutes, and re-framed it, and had it narrated in the style of the old Sun Classic Pictures and those strange pseudo-documentaries that got wide releases on secondary markets in the US through the 1970's. They even named it THE LAST DAYS OF PLANET EARTH(kind of like THE LATE GREAT PLANET EARTH, another 70's pseudo-documentary) The result is kind of a mess, and while it retains some of the cool imagery, it jettisons a lot more making scenes jump along inexplicably and the whole thing becomes a "THis was just a possibility. We can change the future" kind of ending. It then was sold directly to VHS and TV so it wound up appearing usually very late at night on the old TNT "100% Weird" and AMC(when they showed a lot of old retro movies).One scene that was excised, for a time, in the Japanese LAser Disk print was that of the mutant humanoids fighting over a worm. It was such a disturbing scene that Toho removed it after complaints from Hiroshima survivors and such. So it made the US print highly sought after even in the truncated and panned and scanned form(the US VHS and LD copies were from a 16mm print) in Japan. Later, Toho would restore the scene.

Perhaps the US holders of the film, Classic Media, will see to releasing this film in it's full Japanese version.

The largely inferior American bastardization is a genuine travesty. I recently saw the original 114 minute Japanese language version on glorious widescreen. I must say this film packs a serious wallop. Unlike the US version which goes for the throat in the first ten minutes, this version takes time to properly develop it's characters and set up the mood. The film opens up in feudal Japan with a descendent of Nishiyama (Tetsuro Tamba)being persecuted for bringing the writings of Nostradamus into the country. His father was also persecuted during WWII as he predicts the rise of Hitler. The opening credits are chilling, one of the best intros I have ever seen in a movie. The music by Isao Tomita is one of the best film scores ever produced. I hope Toho ends the studio ban. This year marks its 30th anniversary and it's been banned for over 20 years. What are they so afraid of? Their are plenty of films over there more offensive to sensitivities than this film. This is a very different kind of Toho film and the US version obscures it. There's graphic violence, brief nudity and the handling of its subject matter is unflinching. Many of the scenes presented in the US version that appear nonsensical, pointless and mediocre are all explained here. The actors do a fine acting job (Seven Samurai and Godzilla's Takashi Shimura makes an appearance as a doctor) and Kaoru Yumi is a real hottie. The director Toshio Masuda and screenwriter Yoshimistu Banno (the Godzilla vs Hedora director) do a splendid job balancing beauty and the grotesque. this film is SUPERIOR to all other disaster films because it has heart, spirit and a brutal go-for-the-throat approach. The filmmakers were fearless making this. Lastly, Teruyoshi Nakano's special effects are superb to say the least, but admittingly some scenes dont work (the giant bats and the little girl jumping incredible heights). The traffic jam explosion scene is amazing. There's some stock Footage from The Submersion of Japan and The Last War, though. A subtitled print has to exist somewhere. I really hope classic media does a wonderful job on the DVD release.