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Greetings, and welcome to VIEWING THE CLASSICS. Here you'll find capsule reviews of vintage movies from the early days of cinema through the 1970s, with a special emphasis on sci-fi, horror, and mystery movies. Be sure to check out the Pages links, where you can find a Film Index of all my reviews, links to the reviews organized by cast members, directors, and other contributors, and links to my reviews of the films of talented young director Joshua Kennedy.

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Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Rodan (1956)

Starring Kenji Sahara, Yumi Shirakawa, Akihiko Hirata, Akio Kobori, Yasuko Nakata
Directed by Ishiro Honda
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)

A mining accident breaks opens a sealed cavern containing prehistoric creatures, including two giant flying reptiles that cause disasters and terrorize nearby cities.

Honda's followup to his successful Gojira is another fine Japanese monster picture, with an intriguing story and good production values.  Although the special effects are primitive by today's standards, they're well-done for the era, and distinctive and memorable, especially a sequence in which one of the Rodans hatches from a massive egg.  Honda efficiently builds suspense by keeping his monsters off screen for as long as possible, and the screenwriters wisely keep the subplots of the human characters secondary to keep the film moving at a lively pace.

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