7.24.2010

MOTHRA and GAMERA VS. GUIRON to be shown!


Source: http://www.zandavisitor.com/newsarticle-3763-DinoQuest_Monster_Movie_Night_at_Missouri_Botanical_Garden
Thanks To Avery Guerra!
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End the summer with a bang for on July 30, the Missouri Botanical Gardens' DinoQuest Monster Movie Night is showing at 8:30 pm the 1961 classic "Mothra" and right afterwards "Gamera vs. Gurion". This is from the site:
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"Both films will be shown on a giant screen at the Cohen Amphitheater, located west of the Climatron dome on the Garden grounds. Lawn seating only; guests are welcome to bring lawn chairs or blankets and to picnic at this special event. Snacks and beverages will also be available for purchase.

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The Missouri Botanical Garden is located at 4344 Shaw Blvd. in south St. Louis, accessible from Interstate 44 at the Vandeventer exit and from Interstate 64 at the Kingshighway North & South exit. Free parking is available on-site and two blocks west at the corner of Shaw and Vandeventer.
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For more information about the DinoQuest Monster Movie Night, visit www.mobot.org/dinoquest/monster_movie.asp. To learn more about the DinoQuest exhibition, visit www.mobot.org/dinoquest. For general Garden information, visit http://www.mobot.org/ or call (314) 577-5100 (toll-free, 1-800-642-8842)."


Support kaiju Missouri fans!

7.20.2010

Kaiju Book News for the Masses!

NOTE: ROUGH TRANSLATIONS AHEAD!

Gamera and Godzilla has come back for the attack this latter half of the year when it comes to books! First up is the book "Daiei Tokusatsu Film Encyclopedia: Daikaiju Fantasy Battle - Gamera vs. Daimajin". The book is 121 pages long, and with a price tag of 1890 Yen, with these stats:


ISBN-10: 4048545116
ISBN-13: 978-4048545112
Release Date: 2010/7/16
Product Dimensions: 11.6 x 8.3 x 0.5 inches







The second with a nice pic of a Bandai vinyl is roughly translated to "Goodbye Godzilla who - far from war". At a much longer 280 pages, the book is a fair 1995 Yen in cost. Here are it’s stats:
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ISBN-10: 4000230352
ISBN-13: 978-4000230353
Release Date: 2010/7/29
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The third is THE MUSIC OF GODZILLA: THE ECHOES & THE ERA OF AKIRA IFUKUBE, MASARU SATO, KUNIO MIYAUCHI AND RIICHIRO MANABE" ("Gojira-no Ongaku - Ifukube Akira, Satou Masaru, Miyauchi Kunio, Manabe Riichirou-no Hibiki-to Sono Jidai")(thanks to James Ballard). Acording to August Ragone, "The author is Atsushi Kobayashi, who had written two previous books on Akira Ifukube (as well as other film composers, such as Masaru Sato), and the publisher is Sakuinsha. This particular book will only cover the Godzilla scores from 1954-1975." Gonna be released on 8/10/2010 containing a whooping 480 pages. Here is the book’s stats:
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ISBN-10: 4861822998
ISBN-13: 978-4861822995
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Happy Buying!

7.10.2010

New Book: "Kaiju Life - The Original Godzilla Actor Haruo Nakajima" by Haruo Nakajima

Title via Japanese: "怪獣人生 ~元祖ゴジラ俳優・中島春雄"
Publisher: "洋泉社"
Language: Japanese
ISBN-10: 4862485898
ISBN-13: 978-4862485892
Release Date: 2010/7/16
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There will be pictures. For more information, someone more versed in Japanese can go to links below:
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Could this be part of the "The Ghost of Godzilla: The Man Who Was Godzilla: On The Shoulders of Monsters: In the Shadow of the Monster: Unzipping the Mystery" documentry that Haruo Nakajima is supposedly working on with "Team WereWolf" (so says wikipedia)? More details tom come.

7.04.2010

First TV Spot for "MM9"

Thanks to the Nippon Cinema site, we can now see the official monster-less TV spot for Shinji Higuchi's "MM9":

http://www.nipponcinema.com/blog/tv-spot-for-shinji-higuchis-mm9/

And it is interesting to note that the trailer shows a new website adress for coverage of the series:

www.mmmmmmmmm.jp

Very cool indeed.

7.01.2010

Plaza Atlanta Theatre's Silver Scream Spook Show GODZILLA VS. GIGAN details



This July 31, the Plaza Atlanta Theatre in association with the Silver Scream Spook Show will be giving a special presentation of GODZILLA VS. GIGAN, under the name GODZILLA ON MONSTER ISLAND.
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The theatre is Atlanta’s oldest cinematic venue. A uniscreened theatre, it was once a grindhouse theatre which is now run for non profit and has film showing everything from THE ROOM to THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW to even film festivals hosted by Robert Osborne (who does things for the TCM Channel - including one time giving an into on TCM to "Space Monster Guilala"). The Plaza Atlanta theatre has a good history with kaiju fans, including having previously screened "Rodan" (1956), "Mothra" (1961), "Ebirah, Horror from the Deep" (1966), "Destroy All Monsters" (1968), and "Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack" (2001).
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The Silver Scream Spook show is like Mr. Lobo or "Ms. Monster’s Hell On Ice" meets Vaudeville. Shane Morton and his group put on the "Silver Scream Spook How", a 30 minute show put on before each of their screenings with some Horror Host elements which helps integrate the show into the film to be shown (to some extent). The sketch they put on has something in relation to the film they will be hosting. It is great fun for whoever comes.

KIDS UNDER 12 FREE AT 1:00 MATINEE! EVERYONE ELSE ONLY $7. ALL TICKETS ARE $10 FOR THE 10:00 SHOW!
Do not forget to bring in some extra cash for pop corn, drinks, and any possible dealers at the event. It is sure to be great fun. And for those staying in the south eastern United States would be glad to know that from the theatre it is just another 10 hour drive to the Morikami Museum, who is having a kaiju vinyl exhibit all this summer (http://godzilla2012.blogspot.com/2010/06/over-100-vintage-kaiju-toys-invade.html). Hope to see you there!

GSPBS6 Review: Godzilla Tokyo SOS

By: Matti Keskiivari
Movie: Godzilla: Tokyo SOS
Music by: Michiru Oshima
Record label: Toho Music
Running time: 77:19/74:19
Discs: 2
Year of release: 2010
Review: ***1/2/*****

Right after the Godzilla: Final Wars set, this two-disc set is probably the most "interesting" in the sixth Godzilla soundtrack box. The first disc features the score of Godzilla: Tokyo SOS (2003) and the second disc has the rest of the GFW bonus tracks.

First, let’s talk about Tokyo SOS. This movie is a sequel to the previous one, Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla, so naturally the music is once again composed by Michiru Oshima. The score is not quite as fantastic as GXMG since a smaller orchestra is utilized again, but it is a bit more stellar than Godzilla vs. Megaguirus in my opinion. Oshima brings back many of the themes heard in GXMG while also delivering some new ones. Godzilla’s theme is still as great as ever, as well as the theme of Kiryu (Mechagodzilla), but of course they lack some of the power they had in GXMG. The Kiryu Squadron march is used a couple of times too. Moving on to the new themes: There’s a main battle theme that’s heard for the first time in "Toho Logo~Mothra in Flight~Main Title", one of the highlights of this score. There’s also a secondary battle theme for the fight between Godzilla and Mothra, which is heard in all three "Adult Mothra X Godzilla" tracks for example. Yoshito Chujo, the film’s hero, is given his own impressive theme, very much like Akane Yashiro in GXMG. Also, like with Akane, the theme has both an action-oriented version (heard in tracks 32, 33 and 35) and a more soothing one (heard in tracks 7, 13 and 19). Mothra has a new theme of her own, heard n tracks like "The Shobijin Visit", "Adult Mothra Comes Flying" and "The Mothra Larvae Cross the Sea" (one of the cues that weren’t used in the movie). Not too surprisingly, the always-memorable "Mothra’s Song", originally composed by Yuji Koseki, makes a return, this time performed by Masami Nagasawa and Chihiro Otsuka who play the Shobijin (the little fairies). Another track that has to be mentioned is the "End Credits" cue. It’s simply one of the best pieces of music Michiru Oshima has composed for the Godzilla series. It sounds really distinct from the rest of the score, as it’s very calm and soothing, and it features some great choral work. Tracks like this show how versatile Oshima is as a composer.

Tokyo SOS has only got four bonus tracks. The first one, "Send-Off Party BGM", is a real gem. Like the name says, it’s the background music heard during the party scene early in the movie. However, unlike some of the other BGM-style tracks from other Godzilla/kaiju movies, it’s very memorable and enjoyable to listen to as it’s got a fitting classical sound. The next two extra tracks are certain cues mixed together like they’re heard in the movie. These tracks are supposedly taken from a 5.1 channel film source, as sometimes the volume level changes according to the events in the movie. The final track is the "pop song" version of "Mothra’s Song", which is a welcome addition.

The second disc, as I mentioned earlier, has the remaining bonus tracks of Godzilla: Final Wars (2004), most of which are composed by Keith Emerson. The disc starts off with all the edited cues that were included on the original album, although for some reason the edited "Gotengo vs. Manda" cue (track 4 on the original album) is left out. Speaking of which, there are two more Emerson tracks that aren’t included here: a longer version of the Infant Island track and an arrangement of the Earth Defense Force theme. These tracks can be found on the third disc of Emerson’s At the Movies set, which has music from all of Emerson’s other scores too. Getting back on topic, next up on this disc there are several outtakes, including Emerson’s unused music for the battle between Godzilla, Rodan, Anguirus and King Caesar, which is actually his medley of a couple of Ifukube themes: the Great Monster War March and the Maser march from War of the Gargantuas. He also composed a piece for Godzilla’s short fight with Hedorah and Ebirah, which sounds much better than the Nobuhiko Morino cue that was ultimately used for the scene. On the other hand, his "Xilien Ship" and "Parody Spy Music into Serious" tracks are quite awful, so fortunately they weren’t used in the movie.

The last 15 tracks are Emerson’s original demos, some of which are interesting and others are not. Many of them sound fairly identical to tracks that were either heard in the movie or not. For example, track 23 is an early version of the "Highway Battle" cue, track 30 is an early version of "Rodan Attacks New York" and tracks 22, 24 and 32 are early versions of the Earth Defense Force theme. Interestingly enough, track 32 is recorded in mono, while all the other tracks are in stereo. A couple of the demo tracks (tracks 25-26) feature music that hasn’t been heard before (not even in the outtake cues). The first one is totally bad and forgettable, while the second one sounds intriguingly more like Emerson’s score from Nighthawks (1981). Some of the demos with familiar music sound expectedly worse than the final cues, while others actually sound more interesting than the versions used in the movie, like the "Highway Battle" demo and thefirst of the two demos featuring the "Ending" theme (track 27). The second "Ending" demo is the last track on this disc, and it starts out interestingly, utilizing Godzilla’s footsteps from the original 1954 movie and Ifukube’s main theme as well, but then it takes a turn for the worse as Emerson, for some odd reason, decides to add annoying beeping synthesizer sounds over the Ifukube theme.

The booklet has got a nice picture of Godzilla from Tokyo SOS on the front cover and images of Miho Yoshioka and Masami Nagasawa and Chihiro Otsuka on the back. Included in the booklet is an interview with Shusuke Kaneko, the director of Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001).

In the end, this two-disc set is definitely the weakest link of the sixth Godzilla soundtrack box. The score of Godzilla: Tokyo SOS is great, but the content of the third GFW disc is mostly a disappointment. There are some worthwhile tracks, but the rest fails to keep the listener’s interest up. But still, if you’d like to get both the Tokyo SOS soundtrack and the GFW material, get the sixth box.