Starring Akira Kubo, Kumi Mizuno, Hiroshi Koizumi, Kenji Sahara, Hiroshi Tachikawa
Directed by Ishiro Honda
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)
After a yacht is wrecked by a storm, the passengers and crew make it to an island where they learn the mushrooms are radioactive, and may have transformed other people on the island into creatures.
An impressive film from Ishiro Honda, very different from his kaiju productions, offers an interesting mystery story among the drama of the castaways looking for a way to survive, and although there are indeed mushroom creatures to behold, their reality within the plot line falls under doubt, with hallucinations or dream visions also taking place. Honda and his writers use the castaways in the familiar but effective structure of a microcosm of humanity, with the conflict exposing which characters are pure of heart and which are driven by greed or antagonism. The special effects and suit actors, although employed less than in a kaiju film, are well-presented, but I found the film's creepiest moment to be the eerie laughter that accompanies the growth of the mushrooms in the island's rain.
It took me years to finally see this film, totally worth it. Often called "Attack of the Mushroom People", this movie is regularly (and unfairly) picked on.
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