Ido zero daisakusen (1969)

Director:

Ishirô Honda

Writers:

Warren Lewis (additional dialogue)
Shinichi Sekizawa (writer)

Release Date:

26 July 1969 (Japan)

Genre:

Family | Action | Adventure | Sci-Fi | Fantasy

Tagline:

Discover the incredible world of tomorrow... 15 miles straight down at LATITUDE ZERO

Plot Keywords:

Transplantation | Giant Bat | Condor | Utopia | Diamond

Cast

Joseph Cotten	...	Capt. Craig McKenzie / Cmdr. Glenn McKenzie
Cesar Romero	...	Dr. Malic / Lt. Hastings
Akira Takarada	...	Dr. Ken Tashiro
Masumi Okada	...	Dr. Jules Masson
Richard Jaeckel	...	Perry Lawton
Patricia Medina	...	Lucretia
Tetsu Nakamura	...	Dr. Okada
Mari Nakayama	...	Tsuruko Okada
Akihiko Hirata	...	Dr. Sugata
Wataru Omae	...	Advisor
Hikaru Kuroki	...	Capt. Kroiga
Linda Haynes	...	Dr. Anne Barton
Susumu Kurobe	...	Chin
Burr Middleton	...	Additional Voices (voice)
Haruo Nakajima	...	Flying Lion / Giant Rat

Also Known As:

Atragon II (International: English title)
Ido 0 daisakusen (Japan) (alternative spelling)
Kaitei Daisenso - Ido Zero Daisakusen
Latitude Zero (USA)
Latitude Zero Military Tactics
Latitude Zero: Big Military Operation

Runtime:

Japan:89 min | USA:105 min

Country:

USA | Japan

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

UK:A (original rating) | USA:G

Company:

Ambassador Productions

Trivia:

Although this was only special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya's next-to-last film, it was also not only his last sci-fi/fantasy film, but the last time he would work with director Ishirô Honda, with whom he worked on many of Toho's classic tokusatsu movies, including the Godzilla series.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: Obvious wires visible when the bat creature swoops down to attack the heroes during the climactic battle in the laboratory.

Movie Connections:

References The Wizard of Oz (1939)

A funride for Jap monster movie lovers!

Another memory from my childhood! I was about 7 or 8 years old when I saw this film and it really freaked me at this time! Recently, I watched "Ido zero daisakusen" again and it had great nostalgia-values!! Giant rats, bat-like creatures... this flick directed by Godzilla´s spiritual father Ishiro Honda has everything a great Japanese monster movie needs! Plus the great performances of Richard Jaeckel, who made some extraordinary alien-experiences in "The Green Slime" as well as Cesare Romero, unforgettable as sneering bad guy Joker in the 1960s Batman-series! The biggest surprise however was the appearance of Joseph Cotten, an actor that also starred in the Orson Welles-classic "Citizen Kane" or Carol Reed´s "The 3rd Man"... so he´s next to Russ Tamblyn or Raymond Burr a further US-actor who can add a Japanese Sci-fi movie to his filmography. "Atragon II" may be a little bit cheesy compared to nowaday´s standard (Which Asian monster flick from those days is not?!?), but all the multimillion Dollar CGI-F/X can´t deal with the great naive charm this film delivers! A cult classic!!!