The History of King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)

foreign 1962's King Kong vs Godzilla directed by Ichiro Honda it's the United States monster versus Japan's monster who would come out on top as I talked about last time ishirohanda may not have been involved with Godzilla Raids Again in 1955 but he would go on to direct numerous monster movies in the seven years that followed early in 1962 he would direct a science fiction movie titled goroth a movie that captured the space craze of the time just a year prior President John F Kennedy promised to put a man on the moon and Japanese scientists had been experimenting with rockets as early as the mid-1950s the movie was played straight with astronauts trying to stop a star named gorath from smashing into Earth seems serious enough until a giant walrus monster named maguma comes along hey Honda would call goras my top favorite film except for that monster as the Director of Science Fiction Honda like to be his closest scientifically sound as a science fiction plot would allow so when goroth pulls the Moon away Honda worried that it didn't make sense that the Earth wouldn't be destroyed as well producer Tanaka would simply say the truth doesn't make a good movie these were good times for Honda the man was finally living the life he wanted to live making movies and spending time with the people he cared for he learned from his mentor kaijiro Yamamoto that he needed to treat his staff well too him and his wife Kimmy Honda would throw numerous parties a year for the Toho crew at their mansion and set a Gaia city right near Toho Studios all were welcome didn't matter if you were big time or not on one occasion a young fan who ran away from home would appear on his doorstep Honda would give him some food notified the police and bought a train ticket for the young Kaiju fan everybody loved Honda so all of the staff and cast would gather when we arrived at his house and he opened the door greeting happy New Year you'd see rows and rows of shoes in the entrance that's how big the turnout was with kaijuega rolling along nobody knew if they would ever hit the high Mark they did back in 1954 with Godzilla little did they know what was coming for this movie's Origins we need to head to the United States with Willis O'Brien one of the early masters of stop motion and special effects stop motion had been around since at least the 1890s with J Stuart blackden and Albert E Smith's lost film The Humpty Dumpty circus amongst others O'Brien eventually came on the scene with the dinosaur and the missing link a prehistoric tragedy in 1915. the silent movie was a comedy focusing on a caveman-like character and this film would draw the attention of Thomas Edison who would hire O'Brien to create a series of prehistoric shorts but it would be later in the 1920s when O'Brien's The Lost World caught the world's attention and then of course King Kong in the 1930s was the culmination of his craft according to Linwood G Dunn one of O'Brien's peers his success with King Kong would earn him an oscar but O'Brien wanted an Oscar statue made for each member of his crew they would not do this and so O'Brien refused to accept the award this would cause him to become somewhat ostracized by the Hollywood establishment of the time and he would have a difficult time having his own film ideas taken seriously after that I'm putting it lightly when I say O'Brien experienced tragedy in his personal life the man's ex-wife murdered his two sons and then attempted suicide herself and even though he was extremely successful in his professional life his Protege Ray harryhausen would say that wasn't all Sunshine either he had so many projects to fall through before they reached the screen how he survived all these disappointments I'll never know despite all the proposed movies that were shot down over the years in 1960 O'Brien looking for a career Renaissance of sorts decided to go back to his most famous handiwork King Kong and write a story for a sequel where the monster fights the Frankenstein monster and of course he planned to create this King Kong vs Frankenstein with stop motion O'Brien would make a handshake deal with film producer John Beck to help him get this film made Beck would have George Yates who helped write the stories for the movie them and it came from Beneath the Sea created full screenplay from O'Brien's outline so it could be shot to Studios the Story's name would change multiple times from King Kong versus Frankenstein to King Kong versus the ginkgo and to finally King Kong vs Prometheus in the proposed story King Kong and a monster created by the descendant of Dr Frankenstein are both in captivity in San Francisco the Prometheus monster would be a patchwork of elephants bulls and other animal parts of course both monsters escape and start kicking each other's ass the story ultimately ends with the monsters falling into San Francisco Bay this is where things get Shady O'Brien would call back regularly for updates and Beck promised him that if anything developed he would let O'Brien know while Beck did his thing O'Brien would be helping supervise a special effects sequence in Stanley Cramer's it's a mad mad mad mad world unfortunately Beck wasn't having success funding an American Studio to create the movie Mostly because the high cost of stop-motion animation so he would go behind O'Brien's back and shot the screenplay to Toho in Japan Toho wasn't interested in the story per se but they had long wanted to make a King Kong movie and now they had a connection in back to make that happen they would also want King Kong to fight one of their monsters to celebrate their 30th Anniversary Toho would buy the rights to use King Kong from RKO and Beth would secure the distribution rights in the U.S the UK Canada and Israel O'Brien had no clue any of this was even going on he was completely cut out of the process and would only know this happened much later O'Brien was heartbroken he considered suing Beck and according to a nephew of O'Brien's a suit was filed but he didn't have the money for a drawn-out legal battle this all became mood because sadly Willis O'Brien would die of a heart attack on November 10th 1962 with his widow saying the stress of the whole incident contributed to his death I can understand some pointing to the naivete of O'Brien doing a handshake deal in the entertainment industry but I see O'Brien as a sympathetic figure who despite a great deal of tragedy in his life managed to create dazzling special effects when the cinema world was just in its infancy and he would leave behind quite the Legacy through those who learned from him over at Toho King Kong's rights were secured and so Touhou producer tomiyuki Tanaka would decide to awaken the monster he himself created to replace the Frankenstein monster in this movie it would be Godzilla who would step into the ring to Duke it out with the monster that partially inspired its own Creation The Eighth Wonder of the world King Kong King Kong vs Godzilla was to start production King Kong's name would get top billing because he was the more popular Monster at the time I'd imagine Kong was even more popular in Japan upon hearing the news special effects director A.G subaraya immediately cleared his schedule this was a dream come true for the man who grew up watching and analyzing O'Brien's special effect work in King Kong it cannot be understated how big of a moment this was for subaraya it's just a shame that O'Brien was cut out of the process and passed away imagine if those two men got to work together Tanaka would hand the screenplay first started by O'Brien and altered by beckon Yates screenwriter shinichi sekazawa who was coming off writing the story for the commercially successful Mothra film Tanaka's instructions to sekazawa were simple less horror more comedy and make something younger audiences would love sekazao was born in Kyoto and he grew up loving and studying animation alongside the eventual father of manga Osamu tezuka creator of Astro Boy I'd suggest if you're ever in Kyoto to visit the manga museums they have there I was lucky enough to visit Kyoto International manga Museum a few years back and it was quite the experience alright like Honda secazawa served in World War II but unlike Honda sekazow was affected differently by the war with his style being much more Whimsical and absurd we often talk about the main four of the Godzilla franchise while sekazawa would be just as influential as any of these men in the showa era of Godzilla seca's hour's eventual screenplay for King Kong vs Godzilla would be responsible for taking the Godzilla franchise and entire entirely different direction in it sakazawa playfully mocks Kaiju tropes and the commercialization of post-war Japanese culture he took tragic monsters like King Kong and Godzilla and turned them into professional wrestlers basically the movie is a downright comedy rather than a dark versus film between two iconic characters this would also be the start of a little creative struggle between Honda and subaraya on to saw King Kong as a stand-in for the United States and Godzilla for Japan whereas tubaraya simply didn't care about the political relationship between the U.S and Japan he just wanted to bring the world these two monsters beating the crap out of each other as we will see subaraya won out and he made a conscious effort to appeal to kids with his approach Honda the ever loyal company man went with the program despite having to watch his stoic revered monster be turned into some sort of anthropomorphized character the main thing I wanted in this picture was enjoyment in later years he would go into further detail there was a huge fall in the average age of Godzilla elephants so Toho decided it would be a good idea to make him more heroic and less scary I didn't like the idea but I couldn't really oppose it we didn't have many rights then once you made a film it became a company property to Hype up excitement for the film Touhou created promotional material that showed both monsters talking to each other like Fighters before a match Godzilla says to Kong I am now applying myself to vigorous training every day and night to capture the world monster Championship from King Kong Kong would respond I may be a stranger to the younger people here but have quite a number of fighting Adventures to my credit there's more but that's all I'm gonna read out loud like probably most of you I'm quite familiar with the English dubbed version of this film but this is the first time I'll be seeing the coveted Japanese version that came with the Criterion Collection showa era book the film begins showing us a documentary program called The Wonderful World Series which is covering a un or a U.S submarine's mission to find out why water in the Bering Sea is heating up the Syria is sponsored by Pacific Pharmaceuticals and this is where we meet our main cast the human villain of the film if one at all is the over-the-top director of advertising Mr Taco played by Ichiro arashima arashima's background was mostly on stage and that was where he built his name but he was quite well known at the time in Japan for the few movies he appeared in as well guy Tucker the author of age of the Gods would write that arishma was even nicknamed the Japanese chaplain by some it's safe to say he steals the show his performance may seem like a more manic kind of Comedy but Honda saw his role from a more distant perspective my point was that there was this one guy in the advertising section he tried to do the best job he could but because of company orders whatever he tried to do became a joke that's the kind of satire I wanted the person himself is serious but the harder he tries the funnier it gets they introduce his character brilliantly having him crap all over his subordinates just to get chewed out by his own boss moments later Mr Taco laments that this documentary series is boring and he wants to attach the company's name to something more flashy it's when he hears of a giant demon god on Farrow Island he gets a crazy idea he sends his two subordinates to go find the so-called Mammoth evil spirit and bring it back to Japan to use as a promotional tool for commercials sounds easy enough I love this part they just get dropped off and surrounded by Natives and the guys on the boat are like well tough [ __ ] we're leaving the two Company Men are led by an interpreter who looks like he's from Gilligan's Island which actually didn't even exist yet he was played by senkichi Amora our protagonist does Sumo sakurais played by tadao takshima I mean there are so many characters in this movie it's hard to even call him the protagonist but for most of the film he spends his time with his co-worker kinzabaro furu played by you fujiki both actors were experienced and worked together before on Japanese salarymen comedies despite this movie being a huge crossover event it wasn't the first crossover and wasn't even the first crossover movie I watched as a kid my dad showed me Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein which was made in 1948. that movie is hilarious and has the Frankenstein monster Wolfman and Dracula and another as well I believe the first American crossover film would be Universal's Frankenstein meets The Wolfman in 1943 but from what I've read online I think the oldest known crossover event involved a set of German language films that had famous detective Sherlock Holmes going up against the famous Thief arsene Lupine in 1910. Sakurai and furu proceed to spread the power of lung cancer to the natives before the evil spirit makes itself heard at times both men do seem to act like a comedy duo even reminding me a little of Abbott and Costello I actually laughed pretty damn hard at that part the acting was amazing by those two there's a clever cut to a lion roaring right after the original King Kong's Roar was altered lion and tiger Roars I actually couldn't find how the King Kong Roar was made in this one but it also sounds like a lion or some sort of large animals Roar and it is absolutely frightening the island scenes were mostly filmed on a Touhou indoor set rather than on location originally Honda wanted to film the Pharaoh Island scenes in Sri Lanka however because the rights to King Kong cost so much there were budget cuts so instead the few on location shots they did have were shot at Oshima Island near Tokyo King Kong took all the money while this is going on the U.N submarine Seahawk crashes into a glowing Iceberg no idea how they manage that on the submarine where U.N correspondents played by Foreign actors Harold S Conway and Osman Youssef both men would appear in numerous Touhou films and Conway would impressively deliver his lines in both English and Japanese it's when a U.S rescue helicopter arrives we see the cause of the glowing Iceberg and the rising temperature in the water [Applause] after seven years Trapped Under Ice by our old Hokkaido pilot friends Godzilla Returns and wastes no time immediately going on a rampage at a nearby military base I'm assuming an American one before making a beeline for Japan Godzilla looks as menacing as ever as he approaches we can see here they created another puppet for Godzilla but like previous puppets it's not great outside of promotional shots audiences had never seen Godzilla in color before and now courtesy of Touhou scope they were seeing Godzilla in color for the first time Touhou scope was developed in the late 1950s in response to cinemascope though both are essentially the same thing Godzilla's Atomic breath is no longer white Mist but now a neon Blu-ray with the Dorsal fins lighting up blue as well the movies being in color would make it harder for the special effects team to hide imperfections the Godzilla suit made for this movie would be called King Goji and was designed by Akira Watanabe the monster is now much stock here and looking more reptilian with the eyes shifted to the side of the head and the ears removed other distinctive features for the king Goji suit included larger hands with white Claws and thumbs nearly as large as the three other fingers this design has remained very popular amongst Godzilla fans a replica of this suit would be used in the 1983 fan made Wolf Man Vs Godzilla and on a personal note my friend Lauren made me a birthday card a few years ago and that's the Godzilla design she chose and she doesn't even know anything about Godzilla so there you go Haru Nakajima would return as Godzilla Nakajima had been busy since the big guy got buried in ice in 1955. he would go on to play varen Rodan mogura the Mothra larva and our poor walrus friend for the scene in the iceberg it would actually be katsumi tezuka playing Godzilla it seems he survived being cooked in the Ingress suit another actor from the original Godzilla film returns as well akahiko harata no eye patch this time however he is once again playing a scientist Dr Shiga Sawa sugasawa explains away all the crazy stuff happening in the movie by bringing up examples from nature he also explains why Godzilla is returning to Japan saying that just like animals he remembers his former habitat the movie shows its self-awareness in multiple scenes Mr Taco is enraged that Godzilla's return has now taken up all the headlines and their competitors are profiting off of it this PR war or ratings battle is a funny jab at how big television was becoming a Japanese society and the obsession with ratings a famous Japanese journalist at the time named soichi Oya lamented that TV was creating a quote-unquote nation of a hundred million idiots secazal was always doing things like this with the screenplays playfully mocking whatever the current Zeitgeist was Honda approved of sekazawa's style people were making a big deal out of ratings but my own view of TV shows was that they did not take the viewer seriously that they took the audience for granted it so I decided to show that through my movie this film shift in tone from horror back to the characters humorously pumping up the big Showdown conveys that this movie did not take itself too seriously as Honda said the goal is simply entertainment there's even a recognition that the scary Godzilla of 1954 was now something that kids weren't afraid of but wanted to see with Godzilla's return came a new theme of sorts composed by the returning Akira ifakube the song that played when Godzilla Broke Free is often titled as Godzilla March amongst other titles and in later years would often be spliced together with Godzilla's main theme acting as an intro before the usual beak gets going if akube returns to the Godzilla Series in style composing what a lot of critics consider to be one of his most brilliant scores back on Farrow Island the giant creature Sakurai and Furrow were looking for finally makes his grand entrance King Kong fully appears for the first time in the Touhou Universe ready to Duke it out with a giant octopus that was attacking the natives in this film King Kong is worshiped as a God by the Pharaoh Island Natives and was scaled up from his original size in 1933 of roughly 15 meters to now stand at 45 meters slightly shorter than Godzilla King Kong's abilities include its Incredible strength and because he's a primate he can be strategic and utilize the things around him but most notably this King Kong draws power from electricity a lasting Vestige from the Frankenstein monsters placed in the original story foreign would be the man playing King Kong and up to this point he had played small roles in Godzilla and other Touhou films but the only experience he had inside a monster suit was playing the mega neulon from Rodan hirose would be given instructions from subaraya to study the movements of Apes before filming began herose would tell suburaya he visited a zoo for research and learned a great deal problem is he was lying as he'd admit in later interviews guess he didn't take it as seriously as Nakajima but like Nakajima Rose had experience in martial arts and that would come in handy as the two would choreograph a lot of the fight scenes themselves unlike the previous movie The Monsters fight more like humans than wild creatures I used elements of wrestling as well as the movements of the original Godzilla I modified the way he moved so it was quite difficult none of the staff including Mr subaraya knew anything about staging a fight even though this was subarai's dream opportunity it's this King Kong suit that gets ripped by critics more than anything he has ever oversaw subariah wanted to do stop motion but of course the time and budget would make that impossible so suit mation it was the original design was drawn by Watanabe and subaraya made him go back to the drawing board multiple times with one of the first designs making Kong look obese the final design that they would land on would offend many King Kong fans the two heads were created by tezu toshimitsu and its Khan's face that gets ripped the most for those who don't like the way this King Kong looks you can blame RKO the owners of King Kong's rights at the time they told Toho to make sure this King Khan's face looked nothing like the originals So toshimitsu based it on the Japanese macaque instead of a gorilla [Music] the yogi brothers would take care of creating the Kong body and they would cover it in Yak hair dyed Brown the suit would have poles added to the arms to give Kong the appearance of longer arms and some shots just to be removed later for when he fights Godzilla at close range a smaller model of Kong a puppet of his upper body and a stop-motion puppet were crafted as well they also created a muppet to let Kong give off facial expressions initially I thought this battle would be super is idea as one of his early Godzilla ideas involved the Giant Octopus but it was actually sakazawas the crew went to the beach and waited for fishermen to catch some live octopuses to be used the problem was the caught octopuses had no interest in cooperating we threw the octopus on the table and poked him with a stick threw water on him and blew air on him but it wouldn't move no matter how hard we did it it wouldn't move we even tried to use cigarettes one story goes that they used hot air to get the creatures to move but another story says the octopuses didn't start moving until someone on the set thought of using the lighting equipment to shine intense light on them after the filming was finished some of our octopus friends were released and some were cooked and eaten by subaraya and his crew so yes there definitely were animals harmed in the making of This film another octopus related item was Mr Taco's name Taco means octopus in Japanese what relevance does this have none I just think octopuses are cool foreign [Music] usual standards except for a few moments a small era you can see is when the villagers are throwing Spears and Flames at the giant creature you can see the Shadows from the objects revealing they were using rear screen projection for this part rather than matting it in with blue screen despite not being perfect many would be impressed with this scene especially the part when this unlucky guy gets thrown around even decades later the animation director for Pirates of the Caribbean Dead Man's Chest told his crew to watch this scene specifically when animating the kraken's tentacles a rubber miniature octopus was used during this part as well and I think it's wrapped in Saran Wrap to give off that gooey appearance as usual supervised crew worked hard into the early morning some days and a young 20 year old named cochi kawakita was there working as an assistant special effects cinematographer little did anyone know it would be kawakita who would go on to helm the director of special effects role in the next big era in Godzilla history almost 30 years later the Giant Octopus was after the coveted feralactin juice of Farrell Island the juice is what's speculated to have made the creatures on the island so large after Kong scares away Mr octopus he drinks some of the juice and as the natives start chanting he passes out after A Hard Day's Work akemi nagishi plays the native Island woman who leads the dance with the others being played by students from an art school [Applause] [Music] this Motif would serve as the main theme of the film and King Kong's theme as well hirose would reveal that he had been sewn into the Kong suit to conceal the zipper the problem is that this meant he needed to stay in the suit for longer periods of time so for this entire Faroe Island part he was basically trapped in the suit for roughly three hours sweat came pouring out like a flood and it got into my eyes too when I came out I was pale all over Sakurai and furu are somehow able to transport the sleeping Kong onto a raft and head towards Japan what could go wrong it's interesting that the Islanders just allowed these random men to take their God monster away Superior would take his water effects up a notch by having Toho build a giant pool set for him in 1959. the infamous Toho big pool set was 43 000 square feet in size and 210 feet deep at its deepest and it also had a 46 foot high concrete wall that portrays the sky super Mariah would have Motors built in that created artificial waves and I'm sure the fish that lived in the tank loved that and yes I said that correctly over time fish would appear in the pool most likely fish eggs dropped in there from birds and Toho had a hard time getting rid of them Kong is trapped to a miniature raft that was attached to a 10 meter long model ship propelled by a small built-in motor the Japanese military intervenes to tell Mr Taco that Kong is not allowed to enter Japan which is the smartest decision made in this movie but it's too late as Kong starts to wake up as a Fail-Safe they strap Dynamite to the raft and the three men comically fight over setting off the explosives this entire part was filmed on a full-scale deck left over from a Touhou war movie it's not until they start shooting the Wrath that it explodes but of course that doesn't kill the giant monster or else we wouldn't have a movie I'm actually surprised this part didn't ruin the suit it's possible they filmed it last also the Kong suit looks even more off-putting soaking wet script has the humans bringing the monsters together rather than the monsters driving the story like in Godzilla Raids Again Honda preferred this as he didn't like the idea of just two monsters fighting for the sake of it when you think of King Kong just plain fighting Godzilla it's stupid but how you Stage IT the times in which it takes place that's the thought process of the filmmaker back then sakizawa was working on pop song lyrics and TV series so he really had a clear insight into television as Godzilla makes his way toward Tokyo sakurai's sister fumiko played by miehama is on a train headed to Hokkaido Hama would later be known more famously for her role as kissy Suzuki in the 1967 James Bond film You Only Live Twice funny enough the character tamiye sakurai's girlfriend is played by Akiko wakapayashi who would also star on You Only Live Twice so he had two future Bond girls in one film hummus character here is searching for her boyfriend kazuo played by Kenji Sahara Sahara at this point was was mainly known for his role as the protagonist in Rodan but he would go on to star in many Touhou and subarai films over the following decades here Sahara's character kazuo is an inventor and we see earlier in the film he has invented super strong steel wire that can hold almost anything fumiko's attempt at reaching kazuo leads her right into Godzilla's path suparaya put in quite the effort with the miniature trains even putting tiny human-shaped Silhouettes in the windows the giant monster attacking a train scenario had become sort of a Trope at this point with both King Kong and Godzilla attacking one in their original films as the train riders flee in Terror fumiko ends up getting separated and starts using what appears to be flail attack in the water not sure what Hama was going for here Honda was not on location when this part was filmed perhaps he could have given her better Direction Honda had injured himself a day earlier accidentally driving off one of the mountain roads he had to stay in the hospital and Kimmy Honda made sure to be there with him and he would return to work a day later in a sling assistant director Koji kajida would be in the director's chair for that one day Honda was out Sahara hearing of Honda's accident was told by kajida not to drive too fast during the scene as they didn't want another person ending up in the hospital Sahara apparently didn't listen as a day prior Honda had told him to imagine if he was really rushing to save his girlfriend the scene was shot in the town of gotemba naria Toho liked shooting in due to the geographic diversity and the ease of getting there from the studio Akira Kurosawa Seven Samurai was filmed in the same area also there was a military base there and Toho needed the self-defense Forces help for certain parts speaking of the military we later see them coming up with a plan to stop Godzilla and they decide a giant hole filled with explosives and poisoned gas is their best option and no that's not a mass joke subaraya would use mostly miniature construction vehicles to show the Trap being built and it's nothing so sort of impressive the military is led by General Masami Shinzo played by John tazaki tazaki would be a regular and Godzilla films and touhou's Kaiju films going forward while the military plans King Kong arrives in Japan and sends in Godzilla he begins advancing towards him but the big Showdown was finally here as the two monsters get closer Godzilla starts to Roar and almost looks excited I like these shots of Khan thrusting his chest out the first few moments play out like an intimidation display from both it's an intimidation display like a gorilla pounding his chest [Applause] sees Godzilla's Atomic breath for the first time and his reaction is priceless wait he can do that the atomic flamethrower that is Godzilla clearly outclasses King Kong in this little Showdown they have and Kong basically says yeah I'm not doing this today see you later bye to be fair Godzilla did have the one thing on his side that determines all battles he had The High Ground don't try it with Kong unable to stop Godzilla the military hopes the giant hole trap works it of course doesn't [Music] and now the high voltage electrical wire surrounding Tokyo are the only hope and the wires actually work Godzilla is forced to divert his direction as the million volts of electricity are too painful for him the original Godzilla was able to plow through electrical wires with ease though they were only 50 000 volts the obvious problem here is Godzilla could easily use its Atomic breath to get past this in my opinion I think this scene shouldn't have been in the film for the reason I just stated but also this implies Godzilla can in fact be stopped by conventional means and almost makes the threat seem manageable then again constructing miles long electrical wires probably isn't easy which leads to another issue how the hell did the military get that up so fast the real purpose of the wire should have been to show the audience Kong's Affinity to electricity and this of course is how the wires do eventually come down with King Kong gnawing on the power lines and absorbing the power to get Juiced up but maybe he got Juiced up in the wrong way as poor fumiko gets herself in trouble again this time it's King Kong kidnapping her and the obvious reference to the original film they basically followed the King Kong blueprint creepy peer into a window a woman kidnapped and to scream that Rivals Fey Rey's Infamous scream [Applause] reportedly RKO required that Toho have a scene like this King Kong's size in this film makes it difficult to reenact the Empire State Building climb so they just make do with him standing on top of the diet building the miniature fumigo doll had moving arms and legs which is impressive but it still wasn't very convincing a giant Kong hand prop would be constructed for these shots here surprisingly it's Mr Taco who has the brilliant idea to use the feralactin juice ingredients shot as a bomb to put Kong asleep again I'm not sure how the military did this so fast Sakurai starts hitting the drums to recreate the Pharaoh island native song slowly Kong does fall asleep and fumiko is saved again Sahara wasn't even supposed to be in the scene originally until a last minute change by Honda he called Sahara up on his day off and had him come in to yell at the giant monkey as soon as I arrived at the studio director Honda said to me with a really serious face kembo you know what to do and he gave you me the script Honda always says that you have to approach the situation as if it were really happening I understood him it was just one short scene but it meant a lot to me almost killed by a giant lizard then kidnapped by a giant primate fumi goes in and eat therapy for quite a while using kosovo's wire as a Japanese military strap can count to balloons and fly him to Mount Fuji where Godzilla is hoping the two monsters will beat each other to death here is of course where the small models of King Kong and Godzilla are used the most what a sight that is Kong gets an early Advantage sliding down the mountain and knocking into Godzilla again that High Ground hello there nice touch by hirose having Kong scratch his ass before running up the hill watching this as a kid I was obviously rooting for Godzilla but I was terrified of King Kong especially his Roar and this part here had me scared for Godzilla as he slowly walks into Kong's trap and much like Godzilla Raids Again I felt the music they put in for the US version made things even more frightening watching it now as an adult I can truly appreciate how hilarious the entire fight is King Kong's body language is hysterical even Godzilla emotes throughout the battle Honda must have been clenching his teeth little did he know what was coming down the road to me what happened was not acceptable personally I didn't want to do it but the company demanded it it was about that time that Godzilla movies started to move towards a younger audience but the fact that they decided to make Godzilla act like a human it was not a good decision this showed off the fact that it was a man in a suit bad idea Not only was Godzilla's image softened a little but the monster's roar was now a little higher in pitch and it's this higher pitch Roar that would Echo throughout the showa era and I would say is the monster's most recognizable Roar yeah Godzilla's destruction seems to focus more on property damage rather than civilian suffering I say civilian because he definitely kills some military members in this film actually I think King Kong may have killed more civilians in Godzilla in this movie and he's supposed to be the good guy even most of the final battle takes place far from a major city as to not cause Mass collateral damage after an entire movie of human characters moving the plot along and I'd say it quite nicely the last 10 minutes or so is unabashed unashamed Monster mashing the usual low angle shots aren't used much here as we see this fight from a level perspective again adding to the professional wrestling type atmosphere though subarai didn't have the same Palms Honda did about the silliness of it all even some of Super rai's Crew were questioning the decision to have the monsters volleying Boulders at each other I still have no idea what Kong was doing at this part and he pays for it by Smashing his head this two second of stop motion seems so unnecessary but damn it it's funny adilis slowly starts to beat Kong to death with his tail this is gonna sound weird but I always obsessed over that odd clicking noise Godzilla kept making in the movie maybe it's Godzilla's arms smacking together I don't know but it always distracted me instead of just lighting him on fire like he did angerous Godzilla instead makes sort of a prairie fire around King Kong just as the giant monkey looks cooked the deus ex machina arrives King Kong is awakened by the lightning and powered up Kong has essentially learned Thunder Punch and even swings Godzilla around by the Tail as he starts kicking his ass despite it looking empty Nakajima claims he was still in the costume hanging from the wires Conga Godzilla continued to trade blows as they destroy the surrounding area this Frame here shows the absolute insanity and Chaos this fight has now turned into as a child I had three moments in fiction that absolutely scarred me King Kong starting to kick Godzilla's ass seeing the Power Rangers lose for the first time and lastly seeing the spinosaurus kill the Tyrannosaurus Rex these moments rank up there with watching the Jets break my young heart every Sunday anyway we then get to see King Kong do something that would live on in Monster movie infamy foreign [Music] this tree gag is reminiscent of 1933's promotional poster with Kong shoving the tree into the dinosaur's mouth Kong then Judo flips Godzilla with Nakajima again still in the suit just showing how tough he is puppets are used to show the monsters fighting from a distance to be honest I don't think these films did themselves any favors by bothering with these sort of Puppets except for a few parts in the original film the fight reaches its climactic conclusion as the two start tearing down the miniature atami Castle an impressive two meter tall prop built by subarai's crew much like Osaka Castle the difference is the real atami castle has the look of a structure built centuries ago but it was actually built in 1959 as a spy resort to bring in Taurus so whether intentional or not this can be seen as sakazawa sticking in one final dig at the rampant commercialization encapsulating Japan at the time after destroying the castle the two monsters fall into sagami Bay so like a lot of things with the history of these films I've read and heard some mixed stories about what happened here according to hirose when the two suit actors fell into the water Nakajima had become stuck on top of him and her Rose almost drowned but another story that I didn't read anywhere but saw on YouTube was a segment from a Japanese TV show stories of narrow escapes from Death the show was doing a Godzilla special where they go through old stories from the sets of Godzilla movies especially ones where the suit actors almost died the filming of this particular scene is mentioned and it appears to show that not fajima may have hit his head during this part I asked two Japanese friends to watch and let me know the context of these stories because I have no idea the context of this show and if these are true stories or just something made up for the show's sake after watching both friends told me these seem to be presented as true stories but it's weird I can't find the story in any of the interviews or books I've read well if it is true it seems Nakajima almost Dr down not her Rose or maybe they both did but again I'm not 100 sure but according to this account and reenactment Nakajima had CPR performed on him as he was clearly knocked out from the fall adding to my speculation that this may be true is that the final story they tell is about kempachiro Satsuma almost suffocating during Godzilla vs destroya that story is verified by multiple sources in the end I'll let you be the judge and I'll include a link in the video description below after the monsters fall into the water the Earth itself begins to rumble after a minute or so King Kong is the only one that rises out of the water and begins to swim home the characters speculate what happened and if Godzilla survived or not then hirata's character chimed in with something important to say thank you doctor that cleared up nothing some expected Honda to have Mr Taco receive some sort of comeuppance for causing a lot of the Calamity out of greed but he ride his lines make it clear that Honda Wanted the movie to end on a positive message of Harmony the end kanji appears and we hear Godzilla and then King Kong foreign as what I see is the monsters taking a bow to the audience almost 60 years later and some Godzilla and King Kong fans are still debating who won before I get into this please try to keep your feet grounded we are talking about fictional characters here with that said as a child I interpreted this ending as Godzilla losing I said as much in my first review on this movie but let's break it down first solely taking into account what happened in the movie and subsequent movies we do know neither monster died as we see Kong swim away and Godzilla of course appears in Mothra Vs Godzilla be it in a very odd way the case for Kong is strong not only is Kong the more sympathetic character or quote-unquote good guy the main cast is literally rooting for him in both English and Japanese versions and he's the only one that appears at the end also the momentum was clearly on his side toward the end of the battle the case for Godzilla relies on speculation we know Godzilla can breathe underwater and so he doesn't need to surface and he's probably the better fighter in the water as well but I don't know how you can call Godzilla the winner unless you interpret it as King Kong swimming away in fear but that's not very convincing as he just spent 10 minutes fighting Godzilla now we're sort of getting into a lot of headcanon I I would say the best case scenario for Godzilla fans is to say it's a draw now if we look outside the realm of the film itself we see that touhou's 1963 English language sales brochure says a spectacular duel is arranged on the summit of Mount Fuji and King Kong is Victorious further strengthening this claim is that the sequel treatment for this film called continuation King Kong vs Godzilla has its Story begin with Godzilla's body washing ashore appearing dead and later he's revived an early screenplay for a Mothra Vs Godzilla has him washing up dead as well after the com battle even more so the story for the unmade Batman meets Godzilla has Batman analyzing Kong's victory over Godzilla to study how to defeat him and as we know nobody beats Batman with prep time except maybe Jackie Chan when he doesn't want any trouble so at this point it's pretty obvious that King Kong was the intended winner however and this is a big however in 1984 an information National book titled Definitive Edition Godzilla introduction was authored by tomayuki Tanaka himself and in the book he claims the fight to be a draw I'd be hard-pressed to find a bigger Authority in Godzilla movies than Tanaka himself so in my opinion based on all of this I'd say the original intent was King Kong was the winner but Tanaka retroactively changed it to a draw I mean Joe I won that fight it's entirely possible King Kong vs Godzilla was released in Japanese theaters on August 11 1962 and would go on to sell over 12 million tickets as I make this video in 2021 it is still the most attended Godzilla film in Japanese history that's how much of a big deal this movie was back then future Godzilla director masaki tezuka would say this is the first Godzilla film he ever saw and he remembers having to wait in line for two hours in packed and overcrowded theaters Godzilla itself may not have been as big of a character as King Kong when but the potential was there superia would parlay this big hit to start his own company Kurosawa would urge Honda to do the same and go independent and subaraya would try to get Honda to work for him in management but Honda didn't want to be bothered with any of that he just wanted to do what he loved which was making films and not worry about the rest if you notice while watching the film that the quality dips at times well that has to do with the preservation of the original Japanese version it's an Infamous story in 1970 Honda Was preparing a shortened version of the film for the Touhou Champion Festival which was mostly for children to watch edited versions of re-release Kaiju films Honda cut about 24 minutes from the original version the problem is he was using the original camera negative and so he basically erased 24 minutes of the film from its primary source aka the highest quality version of the movie so when the movie got released to Home Video the missing parts were filled in with lesser Quality 16 millimeter copies for example One Part I I always noticed during the final battle is here where the quality isn't great but then is followed by a beautiful shot here which renders nicely decades later in 2015 Touhou would find a 35 millimeter reel of the entire film and convert it into 4K to air on Japanese television in 2016 for Godzilla first impact a retrospective series on the franchise King Kong vs Godzilla wasn't the only giant monster movie made in 1962. South Korea would get in on the fun as well with a film named bulgasari this was South Korea's first giant monster flick the monster in this film would be based on the same legendary creature as the one portrayed in the infamous 1985 North Korean production polkasari unfortunately the South Korean monster film is now considered lost heading for their colossal Collision shattering every obstacle that stands between them in the most fantastic Rampage of annihilation ever recorded on film see King Kong stamp Tokyo into the ground holding a beautiful girl in his grass see Godzilla destroy an entire Army as always the American release of the film would be a story in itself the Japanese version would make it to the United States in November of 1962 playing at Nippon theater in Honolulu Hawaii with English subtitles our old crafty friend John Beck had obtained permission to create his own English dub version with re-edling and added scenes Beck didn't think a western audience would enjoy the original story and so writers were brought in to write a new one and editor Peter zinner was brought on as well zinner would later go on to edit the Godfather Parts 1 and 2. sekazawa's comical satire would be completely lost in these rewrites though the movie definitely remains comedic just on a more surface level the dubbing was done at Rider sound services in Hollywood and they completed all the lines in a week for a Time the Japanese and American versions of the movie were rumored to have different endings with Godzilla winning in the Japanese version this was obviously not true but a lot was different about these versions subaraya would avoid getting his name butchered this time but Honda wasn't so lucky Kenji Sahara would now be keiji sahaka Oh Boy the movie starts with the same spinning globe from the documentary series but instead we hear a quote from Hamlet for some reason and then it cuts to a United Nations news reporter named Eric Carter played by Michael Keith and throughout the film we get interrupted by Carter's news reports we also hear from paleontologist Dr Arnold Johnson played by Harry Holcomb as a kid I remember recognizing Holcomb from Bewitched I loved watching those old naked night shows but Dr Arnold mostly just repeats her harada's original Japanese lines using obscure scientific facts to explain everything going on the segment where they compare the monster's brains really pissed me off when I was younger they really try to make it out like Godzilla is a dumbass we also hear from Japanese correspondent yataka omora played by James yagi and of course there's that absolutely pointless report about an earthquake in Chile that starts the film they have reporter Ricardo and Fanta and the poor actor wasn't even credited for the role Carter would use a satellite to get in touch with his reporters and so they use stock footage of the mysterian space station from the mysterians to essentially be the UN satellite we'd also see other stock footage from the mysterians in other parts as well these new segments were directed by Thomas Montgomery and took three days to film and despite scenes being added this film runs six minutes shorter than the original because they deleted a bunch of parts most importantly they deleted Mr Taco's introduction in this American version we're told that Godzilla and King tongue are instinctly drawn to each other because of an ancient rivalry rather than human greed bringing them together I mean it's almost expected for the dub to contradict the Japanese version at this point but this version contradicts itself in back to vaccines at one point the pilots yell and Terror that it's Godzilla and yet Carter acts like this is the first time Godzilla has ever appeared the world is stunned to discover that prehistoric creatures exist in the 20th century later it's even claimed Godzilla has been frozen for millions of years and just woke up thus neglecting the first two films the biggest crime of all here is that if akube's music was mostly replaced with music from the universal library and other scores in the public domain Beck didn't like the original music they felt it should be sort of westernized and that's what I was told to do I supervised the dubbing and lip syncing as well it's more like fighting a flamethrower fight back fight him there's an attempt to add some humor to an already funny movie but as usual some of the dub lines come off as awkward oh my God my Corners hurt ah you and your car on a budget of only twelve thousand dollars Honda's creation was turned into the King Kong versus Godzilla most of us here in the west know of and in my case grew up with after Beck was done with the changes he sold his distribution rights to Universal International for a pretty penny Universal still has distribution rights to King Kong vs Godzilla in any form whether English or Japanese to this day but fortunately the Criterion Collection licensed the film from Universal in 2019 and released it as part of its showa era collection promotion for the movie in the United States kicked off with a handbook called mighty monster Showmanship campaign with a bunch of ideas for theater owners to use to get people to see the movie some of the ideas included promoting the movie like a sporting event and inviting Sports journalists to cover it another idea was to get kids to walk along Main Street carrying signs that read King Kong will win and where for Godzilla my favorite was the idea to have local ice cream establishments create a double monster ice cream sundae I'd love to try that I'd probably end up dying in the bathroom later but that's okay Universal would release the film in the United States on June 26 1963. as a child in the 90s I had the VHS and I remember being so pissed off that King Kong Won because before watching this movie I had seen movies where Godzilla always wins so seeing him appear to be beaten by Kong made this one of those movies I didn't want to watch again but as an adult I obviously love this film the Japanese version is definitely the one I prefer after watching this as you're getting the full story and the original intent of its creators it's not a perfect film by any stretch but it's an entertaining one that keeps you engaged the success this movie had obviously got Touhou thinking of how they could capitalize as I said earlier a direct sequel was planned called continuation King Kong vs Godzilla where Japan tries to revive Godzilla to now stop King Kong's Rampage in Japan instead of a body of water this story ends with both monsters falling into a volcano this idea was eventually dropped and then they proposed having Frankenstein versus Godzilla like com Frankenstein would need to grow a little so the story simply uses radiation from the atomic bomb to justify the increase in size so it can fight Godzilla this film would go unmade as well and be split into two different films Mothra Vs Godzilla in 1964 and Frankenstein versus Baragon in 1965 or Frankenstein conquers the world as far as why for German Godzilla posters the title references the monsters Godzilla fights as Frankenstein's monsters to the best of my knowledge Germany used to Market giant monster movies by using Dr Frankenstein as a way to draw interest as for King Kong Toho still had the rights for a few years so they wanted to put them to use in 1966 operation Robinson Crusoe King Kong vs evero was written but the producers for the animated King Kong series at the time the King Kong show objected to the idea as it was too different from the Animated Series so as we would see Godzilla gets put in King Kong's place and in that movie Godzilla is now the one who gets awakened by electricity and he all of a sudden cares about women it's too bad we didn't get to see King Kong and Mothra possibly duke it out Toho would finally get another King Kong movie out with 1967's King Kong escapes and it's a fun one with Kong fighting a sea serpent gorosaurus and mechanicong but when would Godzilla and King Kong face off again in 1992 there were talks at Toho of a rematch but getting the rights to King Kong again was too much of a hassle so we waited us Godzilla fans the ones that interpreted the ending of the 1962 film as a loss have been waiting and waiting at a chance for Revenge the best I'd get is whenever I played Rampage World Tour I'd make a point to be Iggy and take cheap shots at George it wasn't until 2017 when the after credits of Kong Skull Island made Godzilla fans and Kaiju fans [ __ ] their collect Collective pants Kong is not the only King [Music] [Music] that still gets me jacked up now for those who follow this stuff this wasn't that unexpected because two years before in 2015 there was already an announcement that Godzilla vs Kong was happening but I must have been living under a rock because I had no idea so that after credit scene hit me like a ton of bricks now as I make this video we are only days away from finally seeing the rematch we have all been anticipating Adam Wingard will be directing and judging from the trailers I think we're in for a treat but I'll say this Godzilla better win since the first trailer came out we've gotten endless additional clips and trailers to tease us my opinion on what's going to happen in the film has changed drastically since my trailer reaction video unfortunately knowing what I know now I think I'm wrong about like 90 of what I said in that video however and not to toot my own horn here but I did basically call what appears to be the plot of this film two years early in my now deleted first attempt review of this classic movie story will probably go something like this King Kong and Godzilla will probably fight one time it'll end in a draw and then at the end of the movie they will fight again and then come together to fight some common enemy which will probably be Mechagodzilla I assume one thing I got wrong according to Wingard we will indeed get a definitive winner which is awesome and I'm happy to have the balls to do that Godzilla King Kong the debate finally ends March 31st 2021 see you all on the other side back to the 1960s Tanaka's crew had now made its third and most successful Godzilla film the formula going forward was simple pick Godzilla against other monsters and keep the money train rolling the Golden Age of Kaiju EGA was here next up is 1964's Mothra versus Godzilla foreign

Channel: Big Action Bill

Views: 461,427

Keywords: Godzilla History, History of Godzilla, Godzilla vs. Kong, Toho, Eiji Tsyburaya, Pulgasari, Gojira, rodan, king ghidorah, godzilla king of the monsters, Gigan, godzilla 1984, the return of godzilla, Godzillathon, King Ghidorah, Big Action Bill, Kaiju, Tokusatsu, godzilla vs destoroyah, godzilla vs destroyer, godzilla dies, godzilla meltdown, King Kong vs. Godzilla, Godzilla Singular Point, King Kong, Faro Island, Skull Island, Godzilla Anime, Jet Jaguar

Id: kNQbQzKLMy4

Length: 56min 37sec (3397 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 23 2021