Son of Godzilla
(怪獣島の決戦 ゴジラの息子 Kaijū-tō no Kessen Gojira no Musuko?, lit. Monster Island's Decisive Battle: Godzilla's Son)
is a 1967 tokusatsu kaiju film produced by Toho Company Ltd. and the eighth installment in the Godzilla series as well as the Showa series.
The film was released to Japanese theaters on December 16, 1967.
Godzilla's baby fights hard! The father-son duo duel against a new monster!
(ゴジラの赤ちゃん大奮戦！親子コンビで新怪獣と大決闘！)
~ Japanese Tagline
Have you ever seen a monster hatched from a monster egg? No? You will! In Toho's production Son of Godzilla
~ International Tagline
Japan's Greatest Foe Delivers an Heir!
~ American Tagline
United Nations scientists on Sollgel Island are undertaking an experiment in altering the climate, with the goal of solving the inevitable world food shortage as the human population explodes. When the experiment goes awry and triggers a radiation storm, the giant mantises native to the island are mutated into deadly kaiju called Kamacuras. When the Kamacuras unearth an egg which hatches into Minilla, a baby Godzilla, Godzilla himself comes to the island to rescue the infant. But while Godzilla is more than a match for the huge mantises, he and his newly adopted son are soon faced with the giant spider Kumonga which also dwells on the island. As Godzilla fights to save Minilla from Kumonga's clutches, the stranded scientists must find a way to escape Sollgel Island with their lives.
Directed by Jun Fukuda
Written by Shinichi Sekizawa, Kazue Kiba
Executive producer Tomoyuki Tanaka
Music by Masaru Sato
Cinematography by Kazuo Yamada
Edited by Ryohei Fujii
Production design by Takeo Kita
1st assistant director Takashi Nagano
Director of special effects Sadamasa Arikawa
Special effects supervisor Eiji Tsuburaya (ceremonial title)
1st assistant director of special effects Teruyoshi Nakano
Cast
Tadao Takashima as Dr. Tsunezo Kusumi
Bibari Maeda as Saeko Matsumiya
Akira Kubo as Goro Maki, journalist
Akihiko Hirata as Fujisaki
Kenji Sahara as Morio
Yoshio Tsuchiya as Furukawa
Susumu Kurobe as Meteorological observation plane captain
Kazuo Suzuki as Meteorological observation plane navigator
Kenichiro Maruyama as Ozawa
Seishiro Kuno as Tashiro
Yasuhiko Saijo as Suzuki
Chotaro Togin as Meteorological observation plane radio operator
Wataru Omae as Meteorological observation plane co-pilot
Seiji Onaka, Hiroshi Sekita as Godzilla
Haruo Nakajima as Godzilla (water scenes)
Masao Fukazawa as Minilla (as "Little Man Machan")
Osman Yusuf as United Nations submarine captain (uncredited)
International English Dub
William Ross as Dr. Tsunezo Kusumi / Narrator
Burr Middleton as Goro Maki / Meteorological observation plane captain / Suzuki
Robert Dunham as Fujisaki / Meteorological observation plane co-pilot
Cliff Harrington as Morio / Meteorological observation plane navigator
Bud Widom as Ozawa
Titan Productions English Dub
William Kiehl as Dr. Tsunezo Kusumi / Narrator
Peter Fernandez as Goro Maki
Earl Hammond as Fujisaki
Lucy Martin as Riko Matsumiya
Kenneth Harvey as Furukawa
Larry Robinson as Ozawa
Monsters
Godzilla (MusukoGoji)
Kamacuras (Gimantis)
Kumonga (Spiega)
Minilla (Minya)
Weapons, vehicles, and races
Radioactivity Sonde
Weather Control Capsule
Kawasaki P-2J
Mitsubishi MU-2
Alternate Titles
The Battle of Monster Island: Son of Godzilla (literal Japanese title)
Monster No. 1 Godzilla (怪獣Ｎｏ．１ゴジラ Kaijū Nanbā Wan Gojira, Japanese 8mm title)
The Son of Godzilla (El hijo de Godzilla; Spain; Mexico; Il figlio di Godzilla; Italy; Syn Godzilla; Poland; O Filho de Godzilla; Brazil; El fill de Godzilla; Spain (Catalonia); Le fils de Godzilla; French video title; De zoon van Godzilla; Netherlands)
The Planet of the Monsters (La planète des monstres; France; French Belgium; De planeet der monsters; Dutch Belgium)
Frankenstein's Monsters Hunt Godzilla's Son (Frankensteins Monster jagen Godzillas Sohn; Germany)
Godzilla's Son (Godzillas son; Sweden)
Frankenstein's Island (Frankensteinin saari; Finland)
The Return of Gorgo (Il ritorno di Gorgo; Italy, reissue)
U.S. Release
Like Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, Son of Godzilla was released directly to American television by the Walter Reade Organization in 1969, with an English dub recorded in New York and directed by Peter Fernandez, utilizing many voice actors from Titan Productions, Inc.
Only about two minutes of footage was cut from the Japanese version, including a prologue in which Godzilla appears and reacts to the radio waves eminating from Solgell Island.
Very little was changed for the film's Americanization:
The opening sequence in which a military plane spots Godzilla heading for the radio interference on Sollgel Island is removed.
In its place is the U.S. version's main title, underscored by Masaru Sato's opening theme. The title is set against a deep blue background.
The main title in the Japanese and international versions is placed over a shot of Godzilla walking towards the camera. That shot remains in the U.S. version but it is not accompanied by any text. Similarly, the U.S. version has no credits although the footage used in Toho's credit sequence is retained.
The final shot is textless as well in the U.S. version. Initial U.S. prints featured no end title; the Walter Reade Organization logo played after the final shot concluded. Later prints struck after distribution was taken over by Alan Enterprises replace this logo with an end title card and Toho copyright notice.
The Walter Reade dub was the only version of the movie released and seen by the common viewer for 35 years, until 2004 when Tristar released the film in DVD and the Walter Reade dub was replaced by Toho's international dub instead.
USA DVD is uncut, featuring the original opening listed above. It is also letterboxed and features the original Japanese language track with optional subtitles (with the original names intact).
Saeko Matsumiya is called "Reiko," as in the earlier English dub by Frontier Enterprises for Toho's international version. Both English versions use the original English names "Gimantis" and "Spiega" for the characters Kamacuras and Kumonga, respectively.
As with Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, unlicensed home video copies of Son of Godzilla released in the 1980's were sourced from 16mm prints of the initial Walter Reade Organization version. Official home video versions from Video Treasures and Canada's HGV Video Productions used the video master created from the Alan Enterprises version.
Columbia TriStar Home Video released the film on DVD in 2004. Visually, the DVD is based on Toho's uncut international version, although the English titles and credits were digitally recreated. Neither of the Japanese and English audio tracks included on the disc had been officially heard in the U.S. before; the international English dub, originally recorded by Frontier Enterprises in Tokyo in the 1960's, had only been used in the U.K. prior to this. TriStar's rights to the film lapsed in the early 2010's and the DVD has since gone out of print. As a result, Son of Godzilla has become one of the most difficult and costly Godzilla films to obtain on Region 1 DVD, matched only by Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla. A digital copy of the TriStar release (with the English audio track) can still be purchased through Vudu, an online content delivery network.
Currently, North American rights to Son of Godzilla are possessed by Janus Films, who released it on Blu-ray as part of The Criterion Collection box set Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, 1954-1975. The Japanese version was available for streaming on Janus' streaming platform FilmStruck prior to its discontinuation on November 29, 2018. This version of the film has been broadcast on U.S. cable networks IFC and Comet TV.
United Kingdom Release
Nat Miller brought the international English dub of Son of Godzilla to UK theaters in August 1969, as part of a double feature with Ebirah, Horror of the Deep. Edited down to 71 minutes, it received an U (Universal) rating from the British Board of Film Censors. PolyGram Video released it on VHS in 1992 with Terror of Mechagodzilla, followed by 4 Front Video in 1998. Sony released the Japanese version of the film on Blu-ray in 2019 as part of the The Criterion Collection's Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, 1954–1975 box set, with the international English dub available as a secondary audio option.
The film received mixed reviews. Critics enjoyed the style and monster fights, but thought the film was too childish. It currently owns a 67% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The film sold 2,480,000 tickets. It was released for TV in the US in 1969 and was not screened for critics.
Trivia
*Toho submitted the film to the US copyright office on September 27th, 1982 with the registration number of PA0000152334. The movie was submitted with the Romaji title Gojira no Musuko: Kaijushima no Kessen, which reverses the order of the phrases. The other name on the application is Son of Godzilla, Toho's preferred English title for the production.
*Following the conclusion of Toho's naming campaign for the still unnamed-Minilla prior to the release of Son of Godzilla, where as many as 8,211 applicants had submitted entries, a raffle was conducted and "Minilla" (which had been submitted 135 times) was drawn and ultimately became the monster's final name. The name was publicly revealed in a "naming ceremony" party at the film set with the movie's stars.
*The name Minira started out as an inside joke short for "Mini-Gojira", because the film crew saw him as a "miniature Gojira". For the English dub, the name was translated to Minilla, meaning "Mini-Godzilla".
*A sequence that shows Godzilla leaving Minilla behind on the freezing Sollgel Island and making it to shore before turning back was cut from the final film's ending. Part of the sequence has survived in both the trailer and in a workprint outtake reel included as supplementary material on the third bonus disc of the 2005 Godzilla Final Box DVD Collection.
*Son of Godzilla is very similar to the previous year's Ebirah, Horror of the Deep. Both take place largely on a south Pacific island populated by monsters, and both include a "native girl" among the cast. Also, both end in a similar way, with the heroes waving goodbye to the monsters as the island is destroyed/frozen. The similarities are due to the faces behind the scenes that worked on both films, including director Jun Fukuda and music composer Masaru Sato.
*The suit in this film, MusukoGoji, was used again in Godzilla vs. Gigan for the water scenes.
*Godzilla's look transformed from a part menacing-like look into a loving father after Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster. By this time, it became obvious that Godzilla movies were now being made to suit children. In Godzilla's new look in Son of Godzilla, his eyes were made larger and his snout shorter. The shape of his head resembles that of a human head, probably, to make Godzilla less scary. The tone for Son of Godzilla was a playful and goofy tone. This suit was later used in Godzilla vs. Gigan in the swimming scenes.
*Unusually, in the course of his tenure as Godzilla, Haruo Nakajima only played the monster in this film for the water scenes (using the "Daisenso-Goji"/"Nankai-Goji" suit), as a taller actor was needed for the majority of the film to make Godzilla seem even bigger than his son Minilla (thus the new "Musuko-Goji" suit). Tall actor/baseball player Seiji Onaka played the role of Godzilla, but after doing a quarter of his scenes, he had an accident while playing baseball during filming, breaking two fingers. After Onaka bowed out, Nakajima's protege Yû Sekita carried the rest of the role (besides being a good fit for the Godzilla suit).
**This was the first Godzilla film where Haruo Nakajima was not the primary suit actor for Godzilla. Instead, Godzilla is played by the taller Hiroshi Sekita, who was chosen to make Godzilla seem much taller than Minilla. Nakajima still plays Godzilla during water scenes in the film, which utilize the Godzilla suit used in the previous two films.
*Son of Godzilla was re-released at the Summer Toho Champion Film Festival on August 1, 1973 alongside a theatrical version of episode 1 of Ultraman Taro titled Like the Sun, Mother of Ultra, and various cartoons. The version shown was edited down for length.
*The lever-action rifles used by the heroes resemble the Marlin Model 336.
*Son of Godzilla was the first Godzilla film to feature a female writer. Kazue Kiba collaborated with Shinichi Sekizawa on the film's screenplay.
*Producer Tomoyuki Tanaka was the one who had the idea to create a movie around Godzilla having a son. He told this to writer Shinichi Sekizawa, who wrote a treatment around the concept. This information is found in the 1997 book Age of the Gods.
*The movie was largely shot in Guam. This fact is located in the book Monsters Are Attacking Tokyo. In addition to Guam, additional location shooting was done around Lake Yamana, Gotemba, Oshima and the Fuji Five Lakes region as noted in The Sons of Godzilla: From Destroyer to Defender.
*For the home video release of the movie in Italy, it was retitled Il Ritorno di Gorgo (The Return of Gorgo) and incorrectly cites the cast as John Wembley, Dick Kennedy and Charles Simon. It also mentions the director as Ishiro Honda rather than Jun Fukuda. Noted in Japan's Favorite Mon-Star.
*A pool was set up on stage nine during the production (stage nine is one of the largest on Toho's lot in Setagaya). They used the pool, which was about five feet deep, to film the shot of Godzilla rising above the surface of the ocean. Haruo Nakajima (the actor in Godzilla suit for the water scenes) was on a cart on a rail. He held onto the handle of the cart while it was towed by a truck. As the cart moved forward, he slowly rose out of the water. He wore a very tiny air cylinder that contained enough air for about ten minutes. The water that rushed by his face while the cart was being towed made it very difficult for him to prevent the mouthpiece from coming out of his mouth.
*While the character of Minilla is divisive among the western American fandom, in Japan the character is very popular and well liked. The character routinely tops Japanese popularity polls with one fan poll ranking Minilla as the 4th most popular Godzilla monster, beating American favorites such as Mechagodzilla and Anguirus.
*This is the second time Godzilla does not travel to any civilized land. The first time was in "Godzilla vs the Sea Monster."
*The film's hero, reporter/photographer Goro Maki (played by Akira Kubo), would be a namesake for two other characters in the Godzilla film series: One is another reporter/photographer hero (played by Ken Tanaka) in Godzilla 1985, and the other, in Shin Godzilla (2016), as an offscreen scientist seen only in a photo, that of late film director Kihachi Okamoto, in a posthumous but pivotal "role."
*Scenes from this movie are later seen in "Godzilla's Revenge," and "Godzilla vs. Gigan."
*A consequence of Toho's HiVision transfers, aside from being improper transfers that lack proper coloration, is that more of the image that was never intended to be seen is shown. An example of this occurs during Godzilla's fight with Kamacurus, in which the edge of the matte is briefly visible. This also explains the splice marks seen at the bottom in this, and the other films released by Criterion, which had to rely on the outdated HiVision transfers.
*In 2020, a species of Scytodes spider was discovered in Iran and named Scytodes kumonga, after the spider monster of the film. Similar to the spider in the film, Scytodes kumonga also has the ability to spray silk from it's fangs.
