GHIDORAH, THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER (1964)
Oh man. So in this Godzilla movie (where Godzilla doesn’t get billing in the title), Venus is just sending aliens out into the galaxy to control stuff. They end up controlling a princess who just also happens to have some freakin assassins after her. Elsewhere Godzilla and Rodan (who looks pretty damn goofy in this thing) are just wreaking havoc pretty much everywhere near Japan. It doesn’t take long before a meteor hits Earth, and of course that meteor has a giant three-headed dragon-looking creature called Ghidorah in it. Because if you watch sci-fi anything, tons of meteorites come with creatures in them. Mothra shows up in the caterpillar stage, to basically be the referee and “parental figure” for the final battle. Can Rodan and Godzilla get their act together in time to destroy Japan themselves, or are they going to let this meteorite armless wonder dragon named Ghidorah have all the fun?
Okay, a couple of tidbits about this thing. It was the first film that Ghidorah showed up in. I can see why it became a fan favorite. One thing that has always bothered me about Ghidorah, is that the creature has no arms. I am guessing that if TOHO had given Ghidorah arms, it would win almost every fight it was involved in? In spite of Godzilla looking just okay and Rodan looking lame, they did a freaking incredible job with Ghidorah’s look. To this day Ghidorah is one of the coolest-looking Kaiju ever. This is also the first movie where Godzilla starts leaning more towards being seen as a protector, rather than a giant devastating force of evil. Having said that, it’s not like Godzilla doesn’t send every insurance company in Japan, into server heart failure, burning the crap out of every building in sight. The monster fight scenes are well done for the era, and some of the shots almost look like they were shot with faster-than-normal frames. There is also a good amount of destruction in this movie which is something I always loved seeing because that’s a huge draw for these films. These are all models, settle down. Don’t read anything into it geez.
One of the rad things about this movie is that Ghidorah isn’t being controlled by aliens or anything. He’s just blowing stuff up for entertainment and domination over Earth. Godzilla also has a bit more personality than in earlier films. The human story in this movie is a little better than most, but it is a Godzilla movie, so don’t go in expecting mind-blowing plot formation. I will say that Akiko Wakabayashi is great at the Princess. As far as I can tell she stopped acting in 1971, but not before she appeared in the James Bond movie YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE. She was also in an episode of ULTRA Q which was a Japanese TV show with Kaiju, that was kind of modeled after Outer Limits and The Twilight Zone.
By many, GHIDORAH, THE THREE-HEADED MONSTER is considered one of the best Godzilla films ever made. I am not sure I agree but it is well done. This is another Godzilla movie I have to put in the 4 out of 7 range because I don’t think it was quite as good as DESTROY ALL MONSTERS or GODZILLA VS MECHAGODZILLA.
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