Scanialara You won't be disappointed!

SnoReptilePlenty Memorable, crazy movie

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

fertilecelluloid Although "Matango" is my favorite Japanese sci-fi film and my favorite Ishiro Honda feature, this flick, "The Mysterians", is still a pretty remarkable piece of sci-fi fluff from the Land of the Rising Sun. It is incredibly predictable and almost totally devoid of characterization, but its fantasy elements are terrifically inventive, its color schemes are out of this world, and its production values are high. Beings from Mysteria, a dead planet, arrive on Earth intent on taking over. To their credit, they also want a half dozen gorgeous Japanese women for mating purposes. Who can blame them? They make their presence known initially by sending a Big Bird-like robot on the rampage in the mountains outside Tokyo. They then release a fleet of flying saucers and finally establish a base to which Japan's most brilliant scientists are lured. When the color-coded Mysterians, who look like regular Japanese civilians under their helmets,demand the pretty women, the powers that be declare war and non-stop combat ensues right up 'til the closing credits. There is a charm and innocence to this rather unscientific science fiction opera, but it brilliantly captures the spirit of the old Amazing Stories covers and possesses that infectious "sense of wonder" the late Cinefantastique publisher, Frederick S. Clark, described as being essential to the best fantasy cinema. The Toho special effects department do a grand job with their miniatures and space sequences and they imbue a spectacular flood scene with a scary sense of realism.

r-c-s well, this movie is NOT very brilliant. lots of toys, poor budget, C series acting. You get giant rockets reminiscent of those Buster Krabbe 1930's Flash Gordon movies but the overall feeling is that we're dealing with some upscale (!) version of "plan 9 from outer space". The monster MOGERA will resurface decades later in the 1990's Godzilla movies. SFX are laughable, even back in the 1950's: most scenes are either garage sales toys or regular scenes with poor superposed effects, like the burning effect or else. Overall, not a movie worth any price and not a movie i'd watch twice. The Universal horrors of the 1930's and even Abbott&Costello meet Frankenstein had in comparison sky-high super SFX.

xerses13 We have always enjoyed the early Japanese Fantasy Films circa 1954-1963. During this time they took themselves and there subjects seriously. What ever their technical short comings were you could see they were in earnest. Basically after this period starting with KING KONG -vs- GODZILLA the slide down to kiddy fare began just a step above STARMAN.Though we consider the original GORJIRA/Godzilla as the first and the best THE MYSTERIANS is the one (1) we enjoyed most. This is a SPACE OPERA on a grand scale. Watching it is like seeing the old pulp Science-Fiction magazine covers of the 1930's being brought to life. Basically the team that acted and made the original Godzilla are back plus the addition of Technicolor and WideScreen. They needed a big and splashy story and THEM -vs- US for the world was the canvas that well suited this first effort.We first saw it on T.V. in the mid 1960s and were enthralled like any early teenagers by these scenes of action and massed destruction. But even then we (my brother and I) felt something was missing. It was not until the early 1990s that we saw a restored Japanese print in it's original format (WS) and subtitled in English that what happened on screen made sense. Best of all there were more scenes of destruction.It is a pity that TOHO did not make a direct sequel and made BATTLE IN OUTER SPACE instead (still a fun film). Now that they are more technically adapt it would be nice to see this film remade. The one (1) thing I would keep though (other then the basic plot line) is the exceptional musical score.

LJ27 Many have seen this 1957 space invasion film in poorly-dubbed, panned and scanned TV versions, but if you have not seen the uncut Japanese version, in letterboxed format you have not really seen THE MYSTERIANS. Until I finally saw the uncut version, a lot of things were not very clear but MGM or someone snipped several little moments back in 1959 for U.S. release. Also, full-frame versions cheat you out of a lot of the picture as the film was framed for TohoScope (and this film was the first widescreen Japanese film). The landslide scene is much better in widescreen as is the scene where Mogera first comes out of the side of the mountain. This scene actually achieves some suspense as the soldiers flee from Mogera only to have their jeep melted. The flooding scene never made any sense in the pan and scan version. I thought a dam had broken and I missed it. The widescreen version makes it clear what is happening. Also, there is a brief appearance of a second Mogera near the end of the film comically being fouled by a Markalite falling on it as it attempts to surface. The effects are just as good as anything that the Americans were doing at the time, with excellent matte paintings and miniatures. Akira Ifukube's score sounds much better than it did in earlier versions and is one of his finest scores. Soon, we will be seeing Spielberg's $200 million alien invasion film, WAR OF THE WORLDS and it should be cool, complete with ILM effects, a John Williams score and Tom Cruise but it will never top this masterpiece for sheer fun. Seeing the MYSTERIANS again is like seeing an old friend again, looking better than ever.