There are moments in long-running film franchises that come to be notorious. Joel Schumacher putting nipples on the batsuit in Batman Forever. Peter Parker doing an awkward dance while possessed by an alien suit in Spider-Man 3. The slide-whistle playing over a car jumping a river in The Man With the Golden Gun.
These may be defensible in context (Spider-Man) or a passing bad idea (Golden Gun), but somehow they become emblematic of a movie not to be taken seriously. They’re moments some fans will grit their teeth at, and others will argue are fine, and yet others will celebrate for their lightheartedness.
This brings us to 1965’s Invasion of Astro-Monster, in which Godzilla (and Rodan) fight King Ghidorah. And then, after Godzilla defeats Ghidorah, the massive symbol of the terrors of nuclear war does a victory dance based on a manga that happened to be popular at the time the movie came out. Director Ishiro Honda and Godzilla performer Haruo Nakajima were reportedly against it, but special-effects director Eiji Tsuburaya liked the idea of adding comedy to the giant monsters; and so Godzilla dances, for better or worse.
The movie opens with a title card telling us that in the year 196x, a new planet’s been discovered in the solar system, emitting radio signals that suggest it’s home to intelligent life. Two astronauts are sent to investigate, a Japanese man named Kazuo Fuji (Akira Takarada, appearing in his third Godzilla movie in his third different role) and an American named Glenn (Nick Adams, voiced in Japanese by Goro Naya). They find a devastated planet orbiting Pluto, with a subterranean civilization hiding out from the terrible giant monster King Ghidorah.
The aliens, who call themselves Xiliens, have a plan: they want to borrow two other giant monsters, Godzilla and Rodan, from Earth and pit them against Ghidorah. The unsuspecting Earthlings agree, but it turns out the Xiliens secretly plan to conquer Earth and take its water. Luckily, they have a weakness, found out in a subplot involving the fiancée (Akira Kubo) of Fuji’s sister, who sells an invention to a mysterious corporation that’s a Xilien front.
Something’s always happening on screen, and frequently it’s inventive and fun to look at. The Xiliens are old-school aliens, guys in high-collared black-and-gray vinyl suits with weird sunglasses and skullcaps with antennae sticking up from their heads. Their underground base is sleek and modern in the way the 1960s imagined the future. Their planet’s gravity is said to be a third that of Earth’s, but at no point is that visible in the way anybody moves, nor do the Xiliens act sluggish on Earth.
Plausibility isn’t the point. The aliens-need-water plot is a chestnut (which might be appearing here for the first time in film) that sounds vaguely credible but is nonsense: there are tons of frozen water floating around the solar system, much of it in Jupiter’s orbit. And you’d expect some humans to wonder why, if the aliens will be able to control Godzilla and Rodan, they can’t control Ghidorah. The answer to these objections is: who cares, it’s entertaining.
You can find surprising depth in the movie. You notice that Fuji’s sister Haruno (Keiko Sawai) complains about her brother trying to assert control over her social life “like men did in olden days.” And that her fiancée has invented a portable alarm system for women (the “ladyguard”). And also that the women Xiliens are apparently clones who are allowed no independent thought—except then one of them (Kumi Mizumo) falls for the American astronaut. It’s not unreasonable to say this is a Godzilla movie with feminist ideas, only somewhat undermined by a woman choosing death for the sake of the man she loves.
There’s a lot more in the movie; aliens, and giant monsters, and Godzilla dancing. The movie works because it creates a weird waking dream which carries you along, and if nods toward thematic content make the dream deeper for you, it has that, too.
In retrospect, one of the intriguing aspects is Glenn, the American astronaut. He’s in the film because it was co-produced with American Henry G. Saperstein, who wanted to work with Godzilla’s owner Toho Studios to create giant monster movies that’d play in the North American marketplace. Saperstein advised writer Shinichi Sekizawa, encouraging him to get to the action quickly, and also brought in Adams.
Adams is fine in his role, but it’s fascinating that 1965 gives us a Yank spacemen who, in quick succession, romances an attractive lady alien, gives a speech about how wrong it is to have your life dictated by a computer, and then buddies up with the science guy to take down the baddies. You can’t help but think the character’s come along a year ahead of schedule.
If Glenn’s a proto-Jim Kirk, he’s of a piece with the rest of the movie, a glorious compendium of science-fiction B-movie tropes and imagery. There are flying saucers, and animated lasers, and a futuristic alien prison cell with a door of iron bars. And kaiju stomping through the landscape.
The plot’s not as busy as the previous year’s Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, but there’s the same air of gleeful invention. Like that movie, it does what it wants to, presenting an entertaining kid’s adventure story suitable for older viewers willing to check their cynicism at the door. There’s something to be said for relaxing and having fun. Even when it means watching a mutated giant lizard do a silly little dance.