Rodan

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Summary: ROdan the MAn
Review: There are two Rodans terrorizing tokyo.There jet fast flying ability and there hurricane effect really level tokyo.Its a good flick And i know the spx was not all that and the spx were quite lame but its RODAN.The storyline was pretty good and the action was done very nice.Ther reason I didn't rate it a 5 because it was missing something to it.Somehow The original godzilla had something to it then this.But overal you need to get this its a good kajiu film.

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Summary: You've got to be kidding!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: This has to be the all time worst sci-fi flick since the mesozoic era. Poor acting. Poor directing. Poor scenery and effects...

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Summary: A classic of its kind. Film fans take note.
Review: This is a film for monster movie aficionados. This movie and the original "Godzilla" movie are without question the best of the Japanese sci-fi monster movies. For one thing, it's a serious film. Japanese sci-fi flicks eventually took on a chuckle-headed quality, that diminished their stature. This film is filled with vivid images and scenes. The color photography helps set the atmosphere of fantastic events in exotic settings. A destroyed city burning by night in the background, offset by 20th century neon signs still flashing in the foreground, emphasizes nature's primitive force embodied in Rodan. Forget the endless series of "Godzilla vs. Somebody" movies that would eventually follow, and go buy this classic sci-fi/monster movie. It's easy to forget adulthood and pretend you're a kid again, watching Saturday afternoon matinees at the local movie theatre back in 1958.

Rating:
Summary: A classic of its kind. Film fans take note.
Review: This is a film for monster movie aficionados. This movie and the original "Godzilla" movie are without question the best of the Japanese sci-fi monster movies. For one thing, it's a serious film. Japanese sci-fi flicks eventually took on a chuckle-headed quality, that diminished their stature. This film is filled with vivid images and scenes. The color photography helps set the atmosphere of fantastic events in exotic settings. A destroyed city burning by night in the background, offset by 20th century neon signs still flashing in the foreground, emphasizes nature's primitive force embodied in Rodan. Forget the endless series of "Godzilla vs. Somebody" movies that would eventually follow, and go buy this classic sci-fi/monster movie. It's easy to forget adulthood and pretend you're a kid again, watching Saturday afternoon matinees at the local movie theatre back in 1958.

Rating:
Summary: a very solid Monster Movie, but not quite Godzilla
Review: This is a pretty solid movie from the late 50's produced by the king of monster-making, Toho Co.

In fact, this movie would've been perfect, but the monster scenes seemed to be lacking the kind of charisma that Godzilla brought to the screen. As for the human scenes, they're perfect. By perfect, I mean they're entertaining in a very campy way. In fact, it was actually the human scenes that carried this movie through with its camp-soaked dialogue. I'll provide some examples:

Ex. 1) Towards the beginning of the movie, members of the mining team have sent out a search party to the deepest tunnel they had. As they're walking through, one of the men begins to talk:
"Smells down here. Kind of sour and warm. I don't like it!!!"

Ex. 2) After one of the bodies had been found floating in the water, the narrator chimes in with this eulogy:
"Yoshi was dead when they carried him from the mine. But he didn't die from drowning...he had been killed. More than killed - he had been slaughtered like an animal!!!"

Ex. 3) At the conclusion of the movie when the two Rodan get covered in lava, and burn to death, the narrator begins talking again:
"I wonder if I, a 20th Century man, could ever hope to die as well."

LOL

In any case, there are also some funny situations:

Situation 1) Some military men spot a giant caterpillar on a nearby hill, and immediately open fire on it with their pistols. The caterpillar then kills two soldiers and tosses them down the hill where an entourage of people are standing around. A doctor, who had seen everything, shoves everyone out of the way, kneels down to both soldiers, examines their wounds and proclaims to everybody that "all the wounds were done by that monster!" (nah!!! I'm sure they had no clue!)

Situation 2) A search party is investigating one of the underground mining tunnels. As they're wading through the water, one of the men starts crying for help as he gets pulled down under the water. A man standing nearby immediately fires his pistol into the water where the first guy was previously standing. (I guess gun safety wasn't fashionable in the 50's)

In any case, the human scenes were very entertaining. I never once got bored by any of it.

As for the monster scenes, they were solid. But that's it. It was missing something special. I think a monster vs. monster scene was needed, but that's just my opinion. I guess I just never got pulled into Rodan's charm whereas Godzilla is freaking awesome (overall). Don't get me wrong, though...Rodan is pretty tough. He flies at supersonic speed. And the wind generated by such speed causes cars to fly through the air, and trees to get ripped out of their foundations. But still, he was missing that something special.

Overall, it's a solid monster movie. And for $5.99, you'd be silly not to check this out.

Rating:
Summary: Well Done
Review: This movie is much better than Godzilla King of the Monsters. Not only the movie itself but the picture quality is much better as well. Not one but two prehistoric, flying reptiles hatch beneath a coal mine and proceed to raise havok on Japan. Not as high tech as todays pictures but a very entertaining monster movie of the classic era.

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Summary: True Classic
Review: This movie was always a real crowd pleaser on a rainy day
in the BRONX when all my friends would watch it on Million Dollar Theatre.

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Summary: Classic moral lesson
Review: This movie, along with the original Godzilla, is the undisputed king of the Japanese monster movies. It actually has a moral concerning atmoic bomb testing and what Nature does to retalitate. Touching finale where the surviving Pteranodan creature dives into the lava to die with its mate, the last of their once mighty species. None of the later, dumbed down Toho films compare to this. Japanese Monster Movies Rule! P.S. Obviously, they had time to reproduce because later on in Godzilla Vs. Mechagodzilla II , another Rodan is discovered. I use that as an example because I just don't buy the way it was revived in the 60's and 70's Toho films.

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Summary: Tragic Pterodactyls
Review: Toho, the force behind the Godzilla movies, created another monster mainstay with this one. This time, a small mining community is visited by giant worm bugs. First they cause disappearances in the mine but eventually move out to the surface. But they are the tip of the iceberg for the mine has connected to an ancient cavern containing a gigantic egg.

Once the egg hatches, Rodan is born. It eats the bug worms and flies around. For the most part it is an indifferent creature no doing any purposeful harm but its wake causes severe damage. Then there are two of them and the government decides that the creatures must be stopped as their simple existence can cause countless damage.

The final moments of this film are sad and tragic. Rodan and spouse are not rampaging monsters, just misplaced. One does not feel any victory at their defeat, only sadness. This was a wonderful film from Toho that took the giant monster (kaiju) film in a new direction. Definitely worth watching.

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Summary: Rodan: The Horror of Claustrophobia
Review: When audiences watch RODAN, they tend to view the movie as a companion piece to GODZILLA. In both films, Tokyo is squashed flat by outsized dinosaurs. True, both do that, but they differ in one critical respect. In GODZILLA, the monster makes its appearance fairly early on, so that the audience is carried along to view the destruction with the creature as the dramatic center. In contrast, the first half of RODAN, presents much smaller monsters--huge 'insects'--that Rodan will later eat. These insects are presented as living in a series of dark and damp watery tunnels that call to mind the claustrophobia that Ridley Scott would later employ in ALIEN. Several innocent miners and police officers are killed and devoured. The hero saves himself only to face one of the truly scariest of images in all of the horror genre, the gigantic egg from which a fully developed Rodan will emerge. The shock on his face nearly drives him insane. The shock within me was not much less. The destruction of Rodan and his mate are nearly anti-climactic, and fill the audience with a strange sense of loss that these flying creatures, despite their lethality, yet possessed their own innate sense of life and beauty. If nothing else, RODAN forces the audience to question the killing of animals only for following their natural instincts. Thus, RODAN is one of a rare breed of monster movies; it causes you to ponder the movie long after the monsters have bitten the dust.