(1954)
Dir - Motoyoshi Oda
Overall: MEH
Sort of Japan's answer to West Germany's series of Edgar Wallace Krimi films, Ghost Man, (Yurei otoko), is a lackluster crime thriller from the Toho production company. The plot involves two mysterious troublemakers; the title character who dons an Invisible Man costume and a blood-sucking painter who has escaped from a mental institute. Things play out in a highly convoluted manner, to the point where keeping track of who is who, who is investigating who, who is protecting who, and who murdered who becomes an aggravating guessing game, one that may leave many scratching their heads in befuddlement even when questions are answered. It does not help that Motoyoshi Oda's direction is stagnant and even though he utilizes minimal to no incidental music in most instances, a poor sense of tension is conveyed throughout. To the movie's credit, the kill scenes do have an elaborate, proto-slasher vibe to them as the killer taunts the public and law enforcement by staging his naked model/stripper victims in elaborate "art" pieces for discovery. Still, this is not enough to engage one's interest, let alone enough to make the plot any easier to follow.
(1956)
Dir - Koji Shima
Overall: GOOD
Notable as the first Japanese science fiction film to be made in color, Warning from Space, (Uchūjin Tōkyō ni arawaru, Spacemen Appear in Tokyo, The Mysterious Satellite, Asalto a la Tierra, Le Satellite Mystérieux), is a grand, inventive production from Daiei Films. There are, (very), silly looking alien monsters with human mimicry technology, scientists in lab coats looking through telescopes and trying to convince the powers that be in various nations to take an impending planetary collision seriously, and even a random, laughing bad guy who wants to buy and sell a nuclear destructive formula. It is a whole lot packed into an agreeable eighty-seven minutes, with some effective, miniature doomsday effects thrown in to juxtapose the laughably bad, one-eyed starfish extraterrestrials that speak proper English for our convenience, (well, in the dubbed version at least). Prolific director Koji Shima was never known for working within the tokusatsu genre and perhaps it is for this reason that the source material based off of a novel by Gentaro Nakajima was of refreshing appeal to him as it is not merely a series of explosive set pieces against an alien/giant monster threat. In fact the aliens here are benevolent and cooperative, with all parties involved utilizing nuclear warfare as a positive, Earth-saving device for a change.
(1957)
Dir - Mitsuo Murayama
Overall: MEH
Though not a conventional sequel in the narrative sense, The Invisible Man Vs. The Human Fly, (Tōmei Ningen to Hae Otoko, The Invisible Man and the Fly Man), still serves as the second movie from Daiei Film to utilize H.G. Wells' title character without being a proper adaptation in any way shape or form. Thus being coherently unattached to the production company's The Invisible Man Appears from eight years prior, this one instead plays out more like a ridiculous comic book movie, with a maniacal bad guy out for revenge and both he and the scientists/cops pursuing him using nonsensical gadgetry that only screenwriters collecting a quick paycheck would come up with. All of this plus a liberal amount of convoluted plot holes are certainly part of the fun though since as the title would suggest, it makes good on the promise of American International Picture's "big thing shrinks down to a small thing" drive-in movies from the time period mixed with the old invisible shenanigans movies that hearken all the way back to Universals' Golden Era. As the second film from director Mitsuo Murayama, he does not quite have the chops to keep the pacing up to par and aside from a tense final showdown on top of a roof, most of the set pieces are too mundane to deliver. Still, it has adequate special effects from Tōru Matoba, some interesting silliness, and a little sex appeal to boot.
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