Chikyû Bôeigun (1957)

Director:

Ishirô Honda

Writers:

Shigeru Kayama (story)
Takeshi Kimura (writer)

Release Date:

15 May 1959 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Drama | Sci-Fi | Thriller | War

Tagline:

They come from another World...They want 3 kilometres of land-and...FIVE of your WOMEN!

Plot:

Aliens arrive on Earth and ask permission to be given a certain tract of land for their people to live on...

Plot Keywords:

Giant Robot | Alien | Flying Saucer | Radioactivity | Dome

Cast

Kenji Sahara	...	Joji Atsumi
Yumi Shirakawa	...	Etsuko Shiraishi
Momoko Kôchi	...	Hiroko Iwamoto
Akihiko Hirata	...	Ryoichi Shiraishi
Takashi Shimura	...	Dr. Tanjiro Adachi
Susumu Fujita	...	Gen. Morita
Hisaya Ito	...	Capt. Seki
Yoshio Kosugi	...	Cmdr. Sugimoto
Fuyuki Murakami	...	Dr. Nobu Kawanami
Tetsu Nakamura	...	Dr. Koda
Yoshio Tsuchiya	...	Leader of the Mysterians
Yutaka Sada	...	Police Capt. Miyamoto
Ren Imaizumi	...	Adachi's Assistant Hayami
Takeo Oikawa	...	Announcer on TV
Tadao Nakamaru	...	1st Lt. Yamamoto

Also Known As:

Defence Force of the Earth
Earth Defense Force
The Mysterians (USA)

Runtime:

89 min | Japan:88 min | USA:85 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese | English

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Perspecta Stereo (Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording)

Certification:

Norway:12 | UK:PG

Company:

Toho Company

Trivia:

An early concept of Mogera was of a four-footed mecha, more along the lines of a mole. The name Mogera was based on the Japanese word for mole ("mogura"), which was not in the original script, but was added at the insistence of producer Tomoyuki Tanaka, who felt the movie needed a giant monster.

Goofs:

Errors made by characters (possibly deliberate errors by the filmmakers): One of the bicyclist firefighters has a very southern-US accent, when the on-screen actors are obviously Japanese.

Quotes:

Dr. Tanjiro Adachi: Some escaped. The nations of the world must now stay united in the struggle against unknown forces instead of fighting each other.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "The Angry Video Game Nerd: Godzilla (#4.15)" (2009)

Cool-looking Aliens.

This is one of the earlier sci-fi movies from Toho studios. Respectable Toho actors and actresses are in this movie including Kenji Sahara, Yumi Shirakawa, Momoko Kochi, Akihiko Hirata, and Takashi Shimura-all actors that appeared in the original Godzilla and Rodan movies. This story involves a group of cool looking aliens called the Mysterians, who want to possess a huge chuck of land in Japan and marry Earth woman. The suspense builds when the Earth people resists the Mysterians' intentions, which results in a battle for Earth segment. Just to note, the actor playing the Leader of the Mysterians was Yoshio Tsuchiya. He also played the Vapor Man in 'The Human Vapor,' Controller of Planet X in 'Godzilla vs. Monster Zero,' and Businessman Shindo in 'Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah.'

Eiji Tsuburaya's advanced special effects highlight a battle of fire, lasers, rockets, tanks, and flying saucers between the humans and space aliens. A slow and mysterious, but sometimes militaristic and moving music score by Akira Ifukube. A dramatic and somber story by Takeshi Kimura. Directing was once again done by the great Ishiro Honda.

A cool alien invasion movie, but the story lacks a solid plot and the female leads weren't emphasized enough. There were way too many scenes that depicted meetings held by the officials, discussing what to do about the aliens. These meetings were important in a way, but kind of boring. And, the robot monster, Moguera, was a terrific-looking monster. More scenes of the monster will be better. But overall, pretty cool for a sci-fi film made in the 1950s.

Grade B