The War of the Gargantuas (1966)

What would you get if you took the ass-kickery of Godzilla and crossed him with a retarded looking version of King Kong? Why, you’d get a Gargantua. War of the Gargantuas, or Furankenshutain no kaijû: Sanda tai Gaira, is the story two Gargantuas and the doctor that raised one as a child. Yeah, it gets a bit weird, but the flick is so filled with cheesy violence and destruction that it’s easy to overlook the massive lapses in story development. Heck, all you really want is to see a giant monster stomping ass all over town anyway.

Rating:

War of the Gargantuas starts off with a rather nifty sequence as a giant octopus attacks a sailing ship. The monster stops attacking and ends up fighting, and losing to, a Gargantua. The crew thinks they’re saved, but the monster turns its attention to the ship, essentially forcing the boat under the surface of the water. Once back on land, the surviving crewmember recounts his tale to the police and in turn, they bring in a scientist who had previously worked with a smaller version of the creature, to help them with their hunt. It turns out that scientist’s creature had escaped, but before doing so had become good friends with his assistant. Soon the Gargantua from earlier attacks the city, and this time it’s not alone. It turns out that there’s a green one (from the beginning of the film) and a brown one (that joined the green one on the attack on the city). The military launches an assault and injures the green Gargantua forcing the monsters to flee.

What follows is about thirty minutes of almost non-stop exposition about what the Gargantua really are and how the scientist and his assistant fit into the equation (even though it is explained about three times). Soon, the scientist is tapped to help the military figure out the best plan of action to deal with the beasts. Yet, through a series of events, it comes to light that the brown Gargantua is actually the one that they had raised as a child, and the monster ends up saving the assistant when she almost falls off a cliff. Soon after, the brown Gargantua turns on the green one, and we get into the War of the Gargantua. The two beasts duke it out for the rest of the film, and the military has no problem jumping in and unloading an arsenal of weapons in the general direction of both monsters.

So, what rocks in War of the Gargantuas? The fights. Holy shit. It’s obviously just guys in paint and make up but when they stomp each other, they don’t look like they’re holding back at all. In the middle of one of the fights the green monster stomps down on the brown one’s chest and twists his foot like he’s putting out a cigarette. The other monster grabs the green one’s leg and tosses him on the ground. The beat down goes all the way across the city, and ends up in the water where the fight goes into a weird slow motion sequence as the army unloads (what seems like) it’s entire arsenal on the monsters. Water flies in every direction as punches land on each monster’s face. Even when the monsters attack the city for the first time, it’s a beautiful thing as buildings collapse and people run screaming in all directions.

On the flip side, the monsters need something to fight. So, what do they get? The army and their trucks. Instead of real trucks, they fight against miniature toys and models. I’m talking remote controlled tanks and model ships. It’s not like anyone did a good job disguising these things. The cars look like they’re straight out of their packaging, and the model ship looks about as stable as a piece of paper in a hurricane. Don’t get me started on the “homes” that the models drive past. They look like they came straight out of arts-and-crafts hour at the local summer camp. Yet, even for all of these ‘problems’ I think that it still entertained pretty damn well. Your eye doesn’t really focus on the smaller things on the screen while the monsters terrorize the city, but it does stand out a bit more when the focus becomes just the models as they move into position.

What about all the other stuff? What about it? The acting is just barely passing. In all honesty, the only character I cared about was the scientist’s assistant and that was probably, because she was hot (and Asian). I mean, why is the ONLY American guy in the film the lead scientist? Everything else was just there to support the fight sequences.

Overall, War of the Gargantuas was a blast and the fight scenes are totally worth hunting down and watching. It’s got a great throwback feel to the hey-day of Godzilla, and is a very entertaining flick. I recommend this one to anyone that loves giant monster movies and/or has a soft spot for guys in crappy monster costumes.