This film seems to have all but vanished from the face of the earth. There was a VHS version available for a while, but has long since gone out of print. And, for some reason, it rarely saw reruns on TV. It would be nice to see it revived, on DVD. Great little sci-fi matinee movie, with alien spaceships, giant robots, and lots of model buildings being destroyed. It may lack the technology of today's FX epics, but it has a spirit not seen in films these days.
shareA new DVD was released recently. Check Amazon.com
shareSaw original as a child and enthused over it for years. Everyone thought me mad. Glad to read of people who liked it.
shareI got the Media Blasters DVD. I'm kinda curious what the original English dub was like.
It is very interesting how little this one is talked about. As a child, I played the Godzilla video game on the original Nintendo console and had no idea that Mogera was from The Mysterians. I don't think I found out about this movie's existence until I was a teenager and I didn't see it until I was an adult.
It was made a few years after Godzilla and War of the Worlds. It combines elements of both, yet it's rarely brought up.
The original English dub used actors of Japanese or Chinese descent who employed accents. This was the norm in dubbed Japanese films for many years. Some people ridicule this but to me it's far more realistic than listening to Japanese actors speaking perfect Midwestern American English. (A young George Takei got his first acting break dubbing several characters' voices in Rodan!)
Of course I grew up on the original dubs of these films so my bias as well as my age is showing. When this movie came out in America in 1959 (two years after its original release) I was very little and wanted to see it, but no one would take me! (The TV ads showed Mogera but when I asked my older cousin the next day what happened to the robot in the movie all I got was, "Oh, they killed him in Japan!") I had to wait a few years until it turned up on TV. It's true, we don't see this and many other of the classic 1950s-60s Japanese sci-fi films on TV much these days, although TCM has occasionally shown a few.
I have a dvd with the new version audio(sucks) I also have a vhs copy with the original audio. Much better then the new one. I made a new dvd with the audio track from the vhs tape. Looks and sounds great. Tried to get it on You Tube. Rejected.
shareontheroadpictures; DVD is now out of print. Wish they would restore and reissue on BLUE-RAY. Fubuki's best musical score and Japan's Fantasies greatest effort. See our review.
sharefor a quick fix: it's on youtube. watching the movie atm.
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