Category Archives: Fantasy

Jellyfish Eyes: The New Yôkai?

Posted on Monday, February 25, 2013 by Robert Hood

Images of the cute yet bizarre kaiju (that is, monsters) inhabiting Takashi Murakami’s much-anticipated fantasy Mememe no Kurage (Jellyfish Eyes) reveal an imagination that has taken its own established aesthetic and created a weird, toy-like pantheon of creatures very reminiscent, in … Continue reading →

Posted in Fantasy, Film, Ghosts, Giant Monsters, Japanese, Monsters in general, News, Trailers, Update | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

First Sighting of Jellyfish Eyes’ Monsters

Posted on Saturday, November 24, 2012 by Robert Hood

Two of the monster designs for Part 1 of artist Takashi Murakami’s proposed live-action fantasy trilogy, Mememe no Kurage (Jellyfish Eyes) [if you need to catch up, see  The Art of Monsters: Takashi Murakami and Jellyfish Eyes], have surfaced — … Continue reading →

Posted in Animation, Daikaiju, Fantasy, Film, Giant Monsters, Japanese, Update | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

A Second Helping of Jellyfish Eyes

Posted on Monday, October 15, 2012 by Robert Hood

A while back the Backbrain discussed at length Japanese artist Takashi Murakami and his upcoming live-action giant monster film, Jellyfish Eyes. (See The Art of Monsters: Takashi Murakami and Jellyfish Eyes.) As exciting as that is, the website for the … Continue reading →

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Now That’s Big

Posted on Sunday, July 8, 2012 by Robert Hood

Going on the latest poster created for this year’s Comic-Con, the giant robots of Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim are utterly gigantic. Assuming their size is roughly comparable to that of the daikaiju enemies they are created to fight, we’re … Continue reading →

Posted in Daikaiju, Fantasy, Film, Giant Monsters, Mecha | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Giant Monsters in Award-Winning Drama

Posted on Thursday, June 7, 2012 by Robert Hood

Beasts of the Southern Wild (US-2012; dir. Benh Zeitlin) has been described as “a beautiful award-winning drama that just happens to include giant monsters”. In the aftermath of the film’s recent wins at Cannes and Sundance, words like “magical”, “moving”, … Continue reading →

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Wrath Brings Out the Monsters in Us All

Posted on Sunday, February 26, 2012 by Robert Hood

With Jonathan Liebesman’s Wrath of the Titans — a sequel to the much-spurned Clash of the Titans –  about to be released upon us, a new, rather spectacular trailer has provoked the usual irrelevant internet complaints of “mythological” inaccuracy — … Continue reading →

Posted in Fantasy, Film, Giant Monsters, Trailers | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Visions of John Carter

Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2012 by Robert Hood

Back in the day I read pretty well all the science fantasy of Edgar Rice Burroughs, from Tarzan, through the Pellucidar series and the tales of Barsoom — Mars — with its scantily clad Princess. Inevitably those of my generation … Continue reading →

Posted in Fantasy, Film, Pictorial art, Science Fiction | Tagged , , , , | 6 Comments

It’s Happening Again: A Backbrain Exclusive

Posted on Tuesday, January 31, 2012 by Robert Hood

It happened before and now it’s happening again! Yes, from what is rapidly becoming the main enclave for the production of B-movie remakes, Franklin, Indiana, comes the news that the crapfest classic Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (US-1964; dir. Nicholas … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema of the Backbrain, Fantasy, Film, News, Remake, Robots | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Lost with Monsters on a Mysterious Island

Posted on Thursday, January 12, 2012 by Robert Hood

A Backbrain Exclusive Lost Island [aka L'île: les naufragés de la terre perdue; The Island: Castaways of the Lost Island] is a new French adventure fantasy film from writer/director Olivier Boillot, released in mid-2011 in France and hopefully heading for … Continue reading →

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Old Fairy Tales Re-Told: Jack the Giant Killer

Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2011 by Robert Hood

Having just watched the very excellent Norwegian found-footage giant monster film Trolljegeren [aka The Troll Hunter] (Norway-2010; dir. André Ovredal), which postulates the continuing existence of traditional trolls — straight from folktales, with bulbous noses and all — and an … Continue reading →

Posted in Animation, Fantasy, Film, Giant Monsters, Remake, Trailers | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment