We now travel from the early days of Toho monster movies to their waning days, with increasingly diminished budgets and increasingly diminished audience numbers. Space Amoeba (called Gezora, Ganime, and Kameba: Decisive Battle! Giant Monsters of the South Seas in Japan, where they seemingly love mentioning the South Seas whenever possible, and alternatively titled Yog – Monster From Space in North America) turned out to be the penultimate monster movie directed by Ishiro Honda, and while at this point these movies were expected to mostly cater to monster-loving kids, it carries on a number his recurring themes, and even has a surprising number of parallels to Varan, despite the twelve years between them. This could have potentially been his last go-around in the genre, so it was entirely possible that Honda wanted a chance to get as much of the old gang back together, including several actors and composer Akira Ifukube, to make one of these—and while at times it, like Varan, feels like a composite of other movies, its place in the history and the ideas it utilizes make it interesting all the same.
While we’ve moved from moodiness and black-and-white to bright colours and fast-paced dialogue, there are similarities to Varan from the beginning, as this movie also opens with a rocket launch. However, unlike Varan, the rocket here is actually relevant to the plot, as it is carrying the satellite Helios 7 so it can begin its trip to Jupiter, placing this movie firmly in the space age that they were only predicting back in 1958. Along the way, the satellite is boarded by a mysterious, clearly sentient form of space energy (animated in an interesting way) that immediately turns the thing around and takes it back to Winnipeg…I mean, the Earth. The satellite crashes back down in the Pacific, and is spotted by hotshot photographer Kudo (played by Akira Kubo, who we last saw as the lead in Matango) while flying back to Japan from Brazil. After his editor rejects his offer to go find the satellite, which has been missing for months, Kudo takes a job from a developer hoping to turn the pristine Sergio Island into a resort, going there with his old buddy Dr. Miya (Yoshio Tsuchiya, who was also in Varan), who is studying the animal life there. Coincidentally, the island is around where Kudo saw Helios 7 plummet. Funny how that works out! Joined by Saki, a rep from the development firm, and then by Obata, a not-at-all-suspicious individual with his white suit and Yakuza facial hair (played by Kenji Sahara, who appeared in many of Honda’s movies since the original Godzilla), they head to Sergio and find the indigenous islanders angry that the disrespectful ways of the first people sent by the company (who appeared in an early scene) has brought the wrath of a local god Gezora on them. If you bet money on Gezora being a giant monster, and also connected to the alien energy we saw in the opening, what are you doing betting money on silly things like that?
As we eventually learn (although far later in the movie than you’d expect), the blue alien energy is a collective of living beings without bodies who need to possess other organisms to do anything, and who have decided to take over Earth starting with this utterly remote South Seas island. Good plan! They begin by possessing local wildlife, mutating them into giant monsters—the first one, Gezora, is a cuttlefish that has inexplicably gained the ability to walk on land, and is succeeded by the crustacean Ganime and the Mata Mata turtle Kamoeba (yes, with a stretchy neck like a real Mata Mata.) The aliens and their monster avatars have a number of traits, some of which are present throughout the movie (their number one weakness is ultrasonic sound, meaning that they are scared off when bats and dolphins are nearby), and some are brought up and then are rarely mentioned again (their bodies drop to sub-zero temperatures.) In the final section of the movie, the aliens also possess Obata, who we learn is an industrial spy trying to undermine the resort-building efforts and who sticks around and keeps commenting on matters even though the other characters have no reason to believe anything he says, giving him super strength as well as an opportunity for Kenji Sahara to do some surprisingly disturbing body and face acting.
Another obvious comparison to Varan is the inclusion of the islanders, who are basically the same as the rural people in that movie, as we have a culture whose ancient god-like figures turn out to be less godly monsters, with a more sci-fi twist to it in this one. This time, they have a more prominent role throughout, with one of the major characters being the local guide Rico (played by an actor in tan make-up, just so you know what level of sensitivity we’re dealing with here), who is rendered nearly catatonic for most of the movie after seeing Gezora kill one of the Japanese visitors he was assisting.
This is yet another Japanese monster movie set in the South Pacific, continuing the obsession with the region seen in Toho movies like Mothra and even non-Toho movies like Gappa and Gamera vs. Barugon—which also means it has a different feeling from Varan, as we edge into colonialist territory. Aside from the resort idea, which is not really brought up once the cast reaches the island, this is referenced at various points throughout the movie, as we learn that the island had once been used as a base during World War II, and the locals even locate an abandoned but incredibly well-stocked munitions shed so they can arm up against the attacking monsters. Despite this history, our protagonists are still surprised when locals speak Japanese, including both Rico and his love interest Saki (played by Yukiko Kobayashi, who was the female lead in Destroy All Monsters), who at one point decides to marry him even though he is still stuck in his PTSD funk, in probably the most baffling scene in the movie. The colonialism aspect of the story is really only briefly mentioned without much comment, although none of the characters in this are as condescending towards the locals as they were in Varan.
As with Varan, too, I imagine that another big reason for the setting is just so Honda can get some nice natural scenery in this (including plenty of location shoots), much more colourful than another gray urban landscape, even if that also means the destruction aspect is much more limited than in other kaiju films. On the other hand, they still find a way to portray a giant monster battle (between the crustacean and turtle monsters, driven insane by a colony of shrieking bats and played as appropriately clumsy and bewildered) and death by volcanic eruption, as in War of the Gargantuas, and even some somewhat gruesome violence (when Kudo manages to shoot out both of a Ganime’s eyes—I guess photography makes you a crack shot with a rifle as well?), so the movie doesn’t completely forego things aimed squarely at that aforementioned kid audience.
What’s more interesting is that the natural setting, the cooperation between the Japanese and Pacific islander characters, and the importance of non-human animals to the ultimate defeat of the aliens, are all actually crucial to the message of the movie. It’s all about mutual respect and working together as one big ecosystem—while science is there to identify the threat (with surprising accuracy, given its unbelievable nature and his earlier claim that all his biology knowledge was useless in that situation), the solution to it involves utilizing entirely natural phenomena. This can be seen as the kind of easy cheat that a lot of old science fiction uses, but the characters themselves bring it up in the dialogue, which makes it very clear that this wasn’t meant to just be a deus ex machina, but a real sincere plea to the audience that our only way forward is to live in harmony with all living things. This ends up being played side-by-side with the surprisingly tragic redemption of Obata, who is a shady character at first and then becomes an outright villainous one, but whose humanity ultimately wins out, although he ends up sacrificing himself to rid the world of the alien menace. These optimistic and compassionate themes are another recurring element of Honda’s work, and the kind of thing that can elevate even his lower-tier monster movies.
Much like the Godzilla movies of the early seventies, Space Amoeba suffers from clear budgetary deficiencies—the monsters here are not particularly menacing, and there are some wonky effects (such as the use of quick-cut hand-drawn animation to depict Gezora grabbing things with its tentacles), and as these were mostly meant to be programmers aimed at kids, it lacks the sense of grandeur and seriousness that even something like Varan had. The pacing is also kind of off, as we spend so much time dealing with the first monster that the subsequent two kind of come out of nowhere and don’t get as much of a presence, and the final (obvious) explanation is withheld a bit too long. There’s really no arguing for this is as essential viewing for anyone but big kaiju fans—which, you know, obviously is a group that includes me, but I also enjoyed the colourful setting, the mild imagination of the premise, and the movie’s attempts at a peaceful message (even if we had to blow up a few giant crabs along the way), which I find to be very endearing. Even as the movies became increasingly silly and inconsequential, there were still people behind the scenes using them as vehicles to express their worldview, which makes them just slightly more interesting.
A Scrapbook of Infinite Noise 