It’s a big start to 2009, courtesy of Undead Backbrain and friends — and our resident kaiju artist, Todd Tennant. (Click here to get the full effect.)
Let’s hope the new year will be full of Big Things!
One of those Big Things will be more pages in Todd Tennant’s already spectacular US Godzilla ’94 graphic novel. If you don’t know what it’s all about, go to the website right now. Otherwise, we’ll keep you updated when new pages arrive.
Meanwhile, remember to come to Undead Backbrain for articles and views on giant monster, zombie and ghost films, as well as various oddities and related spectacle. For quick news updates, keep one ear/eye on our new subsite Undead Backspasm.
In 2005, director Shinpei Hayashiya first screened a version of Shinkaijû Reigô [aka Deep Sea Monster Reigo; Reigo vs. Yamato; Reigo the Deep Sea Monster vs. The Battleship Yamato, A-140F6]. After a subsequent upscale “re-production” period, the film was released in August 2008 in its final form — and of course we’re still waiting for it in the West.
Now Hayashiya has announced a follow-up film, featuring pretty much the same kaiju (then named “Reigo”, now “Raiga”). Where the first was set during World War 2, however, and gave us the historic Yamato super battleship as a “protagonist”, this one is placed in modern-day Tokyo, with the protagonist looking like a normal schmuck.
Actually, the main protagonist is played by veteran Yukijiro Hotaru, who gained his main daikaiju eiga cred through his role as Inspector Osako in Shusuke Kaneko’s 1990s Gamera trilogy, Gamera daikaijû kuchu kessen (aka Gamera: Guardian of the Universe, 1995), Gamera 2: Region shurai (aka Gamera 2: The Advent of Legion, 1996) and Gamera 3: Iris kakusei (aka Gamera 3: The Revenge of Iris, 1999). He also appeared in Shusuke’s Kurosufaia (aka Cross-Fire, 2000) and Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Gidorâ: Daikaijû sôkôgeki (aka Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack, 2001). Other genre credits include Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cure (1997), Zeram and Zeram 2 (1991 and 1994), Gakkô no kaidan 3 (aka School Ghost Story 3, 1997), Boogiepop wa Warawanai: Boogiepop and Others (2000), the excellent schoolgirl zombie flick Stacy (2001) and Hayashiya’s earlier Reigo film. He seems to specialise in policemen and comic relief, bringing an endearing (and sometimes slapstick) humour to his roles.
In Raiga, he shares the limelight with a group of cute actresses: Miyu Oriyama (pictured below, with Christmas bikini and cake), Mao Urata, and Manami Enosawa.
The newly released teaser trailer begins with a definite nod to Raiga’s daikaiju progenitor, Gojira (Godzilla), adding a nice acknowledgement of copyright issues in the urgency of Hotaru’s character’s denial that this new beast is the King of the Monsters. Watch it here or go to the YouTube page to choose a high definition alternative:
Synopsis:
Global warming causes the southern polar ice cap to gradually melt, disrupting the ecosystem and luring ancient sea monsters to Japan. Eventually an enormous sea beast called Raiga enters Asakusa via the Sumida River and begins wreaking havoc on the buildings there. (Nippon Cinema)
The film is being made using traditional daikaiju eiga SFX technology (that is, suitmation and scale model buildings) — news which many will greet with enthusiasm. No doubt, as has become usual, enhancements to the image will be made using not-so-traditional CGI.
Below is a series of production shots:
Director Shinpei Hayashiya undergoes a monstrous transformation
as he dons Raiga’s spines
9 is a Tim Burton-produced (with Timur Bekmambetov) post-apocalyptic animated feature film, directed by Shane Acker and starring the voices of Elijah Wood, John C. Reilly, Jennifer Connelly, Martin Landau, Christopher Plummer and Crispin Glover, with music by Danny Elfman.
Synopsis:
When 9 (The Lord of the Ring’s Elijah Wood) first comes to life, he finds himself in a post-apocalyptic world. All humans are gone, and it is only by chance that he discovers a small community of others like him taking refuge from fearsome machines that roam the earth intent on their extinction. Despite being the neophyte of the group, 9 convinces the others that hiding will do them no good. They must take the offensive if they are to survive, and they must discover why the machines want to destroy them in the first place. As they’ll soon come to learn, the very future of civilization may depend on them.
Weird creatures! Civilisation in ruin! Giant machines!
Check out the trailer below (or go here to see it in hi-res):
Feeling that Undead Backbrain isn’t really the place for short news flashes, single paragraph updates and quick discoveries without much backstory, I have decided to start a subsite of Undead Backbrain, which I’ve cleverly named Undead Brainspasm.
I’m hoping I can cajole Kaiju Search-Robot Avery into actually posting to this site because, frankly, he finds so many news items — particularly relating to obscure and independent productions — that I can’t keep up!
I have no idea if this is a good idea or not, but take a look at the site and decide if it’s something you want to connect to.
You can get the idea by going there now to find out the latest news on Jeffery Lau’s giant robot film, Robot.
This poster — designed by Joe Sherlock — heralds a new War-based zombie flick produced by John Bowker and Joe Sherlock, and directed by John Bowler.
Platoon of the Dead (US-2008; dir. John Bowker)
Three soldiers must fight to survive the night in a seemingly abandoned house, when a zombie platoon attacks.
The executive producer is J.R. Bookwalter (of The Dead Next Door fame) and it was written by director John Bowker, who has quite a history in low-budget genre filmmaking.
There is a tradition in war-based zombie films, going back to Revolt of the Zombies (US-1936; dir. Victor Halperin) and Revenge of the Zombies (US-1943; dir. Steve Sekely) through The Frozen Dead (UK-1967; dir. Herbert Leder), the classic Shock Waves (US-1977; dir. Ken Wiederhorn), Zombie Lake (Spain/France-1980; dir. Jean Rollin) and Oasis of the Zombies (Spain/France-1982; dir. Jesús Franco) — to such more recent takes as Uncle Sam (US-1997; dir. William Lustig), the innovative Homecoming (US-2005; Masters of Horror series; dir. Joe Dante), Outpost (UK-2007; dir. Steve Barker) and the much-anticipated Worst Case Scenario [aka. Woensdag Gehaktdag] (Netherlands-[in development];dir. Richard Raaphorst). Nazi zombies feature quite often in this sub-genre — which isn’t surprising really. If zombie movies are about our fears regarding the return of past evils and the insatiable nature of unethical mortality, then these represent one of the most iconic incarnations of that fear lurking in our cultural psyche. But the sub-genre has been used often (as the above named films indicate) to critique contemporary wartime politics. War is one of the great man-made creators of the dead — and there’s generally little reason why the war-dead wouldn’t be resentful.
We’ll see what Platoon of the Dead adds to the tradition when it is released to DVD by independent horror distributors Tempe Entertainment in the new year.
I think this picture is of a monster from a Hammer Films / Toho co-production that never happened.
I’ve been reading Sinclair McKay’s A Thing of Unspeakable Horror: The History of Hammer Films (Aurum Press, 2007) — which is a fascinating sociological study, even if I find some of his evaluations of specific films problematic — and I came across a reference to an interesting giant monster film that died before production began. Apparently Bryan Forbes (who had been a managing director of EMI in the early 1970s) was approached by Hammer in the mid-1970s regarding a film project.
Hammer — like the rest of the British film industry — was struggling to survive, forced out of profitability by contracting cinema attendance, lack of funding opportunities and changing perceptions of the horror genre that Hammer had previously dominated with its unique gothic approach. Hammer hoped that Forbes could help guide the company into new, more viable areas.
According to McKay, Forbes wrote a screenplay for a film of epic proportions called “Nessie”. It would:
…. dramatise the Loch Ness Monster and be a sort of cross between King Kong and Jaws. ‘It was a sort of horror in that it was a monster movie,’ [Forbes] recalled. Forbes wrote a very detailed screenplay, one involving underwater ruins and oil rigs in the Indian ocean getting wrecked.’
Various people were to be involved, including Godzilla’s Toho Studios (according to Toho Kingdom). Bryan Forbes would direct and Toho’s Teruyoshi Nakano handle special effects, with David Frost, Euan Lloyd, Michael Carreras, and Tomoyuki Tanaka producing (at least according to the poster mock-up that was created):
‘But it disappeared,’ said Forbes. ‘Just disappeared without trace really.’ Forbes still has the script, and production sketches… (McKay, p.173)
Toho Kingom adds:
Work on the film had actually already commenced on Toho’s part by the time that the financial backing from Hammer fell through. Special effects guru Teruyoshi Nakano had already designed and created the Nessie prop by the time the project was finally axed. This wasn’t the first time a co-production between Toho and a foreign company resulted in one of the companies pulling out after production had started though, the first being the TV version of Varan in 1958. However, after the rights issues involving another failed joint venture, Latitude Zero (1969), following its initial theatrical release, this project was most likely best deemed left unfinished. This film wouldn’t mark the end of the Nessie prop, however, as special effects director Nakano would bring the creature back as the Dragon in his last film, Princess from the Moon, done in 1987.
Source:
Sinclair McKay, A Thing of Unspeakable Horror: A History of Hammer Films (Aurum, 2007)
Well, Organic Hobby, Inc. is producing a 3D version of the famous original Godzilla (or more correctly Gojira) poster, as part of a new series called Real Artwork.
There were apparently only two episodes completed in this animated zombie tale — Gone Bad (US-2001; dir. Marco Bertoldo) — that features zombies, a priest with a shot-gun and an old fisherman who catches something unexpected to the strains of some bone-swinging music. Call it “Moments in the Unlife of a World Gone to Hell”.
Produced by Mondo Media, who were the folk behind the hilariously brutal and sadistic “Happy Tree Friends” speed-gore cartoon series — Gone Bad looks classy and should bring a few moments of interest to those who like zombies. And if you don’t, why are you reading this?
Episode One:
Episode Two:
Source: via Chuck McKenzie, whose own online zombie novel begins here.
Giant insects appear to be infesting the upcoming giant monster ranks at the moment. Now listed as “completed” is Infestation (US-2009; dir. Kyle Rankin), though as yet there has been no announcement of a screening date. The film is being released through Icon Entertainment, on whose site this new poster art has appeared:
Synopsis:
Cooper awakes to find himself nauseous, weak and covered in webbing, hanging from the ceiling of an office where, just minutes ago, he started his new job. As he struggles out of his slimy prison he comes face to face with his opponent – a grotesque, powerful and very angry bug. All 3 ft of it.
And so begins a hideous, nail-biting, comedic, all-action adventure to find a safe haven while constantly outwitting an infestation of monstrous proportions. As Cooper embarks on his journey, he befriends a ragtag group of survivors including Sara, a feisty attractive female. Although the situation is dire, Cooper can’t help himself from trying to solve his dating problem while trying to save his life.
Will they make it to safety before they are picked off one by one? And what other surprises are in store for our group of unlikely heroes?
The previous poster art is pretty good, too. In lieu of screenshots, here it is:
Here is an earlier “inspiration” for Infestation. It’s called Insex:
In 2005, director Shinpei Hayashiya first screened a version of Shinkaijû Reigô [aka Deep Sea Monster Reigo; Reigo vs. Yamato; Reigo the Deep Sea Monster vs. The Battleship Yamato, A-140F6]. After a subsequent upscale “re-production” period, the film was released in August 2008 in its final form — and of course we’re still waiting for it in the West.
