Varan the Unbelievable
Director: Ishiro
Honda
Year: 1958
Rating: 4.0
The Japanese version with sub-titles. Released
in 1958. The American version was released in 1962.
Just leave the damn giant lizard alone.
There he was happily living in the wilderness among the Ainu people in a
roomy beautiful lake and of course humans had to come along and try to kill
him or her. That's always what we do best. I was definitely rooting for the
lizard in this one. I just wish he had destroyed a lot more than he does.
He is no Godzilla. Basically, he knocks over a few raggedy structures in
a small village and a few buildings later on, but he never even makes it
to Tokyo though he gets as far as Haneda Airport. This one is cheap and cheesy
and shot in black and white. Full of stock footage of the Japanese military
and bits from the previous Kaiju films. The miniature models of tanks and
trucks are very obvious. After Godzilla and Rodan, I was expecting much better.
This is a dull trudge in which the last hour of the film is little more than
the military shooting everything they have in the warehouse at him. But there
is a reason for this which I read about in David Klatt's "A Critical History
and Filmography of Toho's Godzilla Series".
Apparently, a US company struck a deal with
Toho to make a monster film for American TV. To be shot in black and white
and in TV ratio - at the time Toho was shooting these Kaiju films in color
and in Toho Scope. This was to be done on the cheap. The two lead actors
are not well-known at all. They shot a lot of footage and the American company
bails on them. They decide to finish the film continuing in b&w and force
the shot footage into widescreen by focusing in. And it made money in Japan.
People were Kaiju Crazy. Later a version was made for the American audience
in which very little of the original film was used. And that is the version
most Americans grew up with for decades.
Two scientists go off looking for a rare
butterfly only found in Siberia till now. They have to pass through a village
of superstitious people who pray to the God of Baradagi. They are warned
not to go further. They do and after capturing a butterfly are killed by
some unseen force. Who apparently likes his butterflies. Three more people
are sent to find out what happened - Kenji (Kozo Nomura), Yuriko (Ayumi Sonada)
and Horiguchi (Fumindo Matsuo) and again the villagers tell them not to go.
Do they listen? Of course not. And out pops Varan of the well-known Varanopode
family last seen 85 million years ago. He is a little annoyed to have his
sleep interrupted and knocks over a few houses.
Not really much damage but of course he
has to be killed and the entire Japanese military is brought out to kill
him in his cozy lake. This drives him towards Tokyo. Nothing is done well
in this film. Listless and pointless. In one quick scene he flies with webbed
wings which are quite cool but for some reason he never does again even when
Tokyo was only a short flight away and he was being bombarded. And there
are no personal stories here that pull you in. Our couple have the chemistry
of broccoli. Varan returns in Destroy All Monsters in 1968. Hopefully
with a better script.
