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The Rebirth of Mothra
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| Reviewed by Marty Busse |
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Those who like kaiju films have been greatly cheered by the rise in their quality in the late 80s and early 90s, as films like Gamera, Guardian of the Universe have come out, helping to ease the pain caused by earlier horrors like Godzilla's Revenge. We love these movies pretty much no matter what, but it's so much nicer to watch movies that do not stink like an unburied corpse.
For those of us, this film comes as a massive dissappointment. Rebirth of Mothra makes Godzilla's Revenge look like Saving Private Ryan. Every element that has ever made a Godzilla movie bad is in this turkey: lousy special effects, insane logic (actually, more like lack thereof), clubbing the audience over the head with clumsy environmentalist advocacy, a cavalier disregard for continuity with previous films in the series,* and sickeningly cute kids who are the heroes of the movie.
Rebirth of Mothra centers around a Japanese family-complete with sarariman Dad, whose long hours cause strife between him and Mom, and the brother and sister, who have pretty fierce sibling rivalry going here. Well, dad works for a nameless big Japanese corporation that is logging and mining on Hokkaido. Here the movie earns one third of the lamp I gave it: Dad, even though he works for a big company, actually worries about the environment, complaining about the waste of trees involved in making the junk mail he gets. Mom reminds him that it keeps him employed, but dad still thinks it's bad to waste paper, even if it gets his company more business. Usually, in these kinds of films, anyone working in any kind of industry doesn't give a darn about the environment. Dad is unusual: the movie takes an even greater departure from the norm later, by making the environmentalist reporter into the kind of pushy, overbearing jerk that sararimen usually are in these films.
Well, Dad's company unearths a strange seal, which turns out to be imprisoning Death Ghidorah. It seems that Death Ghidorah wiped out all life on Mars, and then came to Earth and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. (This is a nod in the direction of the original Ghidrah, the Three-Headed Monster) Death Ghidorah sucks all life from the planets he attacks-well, not all life, but he drains life from all plants, which will wipe out everything on a planet quickly, which is one of the few smart twists to this film. Dad takes the seal out and gives it to his daughter, while his company is thinking of blowing up the rock formation they've found. The press leaks this plan and opposes it, arguing the rock is some kind of archaelogical treasure.
At this point, the evil Belvera makes her appearance. Dressed up like Siouxie on a bad night, she cackles about unleashing Death Ghidorah. We find out later she's the elder sister to the two Elias twins who accompany Mothra: why she is evil is never explained in this film. She flies Garu-Garu, a tiny dragon...not to be outdone, her sisters fly on Fairy. When I first saw Fairy, I did my best Dr. Evil impression and said 'I shall call it...Mini-Mothra!' This is pretty much all that Fairy is.
Belvera mind controls Dad into unleashing Death Ghidorah after stealing the seal from Dad's daughter. The Elias twins call Mothra, but Mothra is weak after giving birth to an egg.*. Belvera tells Death Ghidorah that Mothra is old and can be killed easily-a prediction borne out when Mothra, after spending a few minutes beating the tar out of Death Ghidorah, flies into one of Death Ghidorah's mouths.
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all those other Ghidorahs, and especially not to be confused with the Ghidorah Tabernacle choir. |
This is when the other Mothra hatches, fights Ghidorah for a while, then grows out of larval stage, saves the day, etc. If you've seen Mothra before, you've seen this schtick tons of times. But there is a poignant moment here, which earned this dog another third of a lava lamp. When Mothra (that's a joke, son) leaves the scene of battle with its larva, it loses the power of flight and drowns, in a genuinely emotional (and well-done) moment.
This is where the movie goes into really lousy territory. Previously, we've seen lots of people hurt by Death Ghidorah's rampage. He sucks the life out the forest, causing local oxygen levels in Hokkaido to drop. Mom and Dad look out over the devastated wilderness. Dad says "Nature took millions of years to create this, and we destroyed this all in a few minutes." This is the environmentalist message to club the audience with-but it makes absolutely no sense here. Belvera cut Death Ghidorah loose-she's the one to blame for all of this! (more on that in a second) Fortunately, Mothra fixes the forest (although Mothra does nothing for the injured humans, who presumably had it coming for their disregard of the environment. 3rd. degree burns will teach them!).
I've left out the role of the kids in this film as much as I can-suffice to say, they save the day as much as possible, in a way that will cause mind-numbing agony to any viewer over the age of 3 . Big brother catches Belvera-but the Elias twins tell him to let her go. "After all, she is our older sister, and we do love her!" Big brother gets the message, namely, "stop your sibling rivalry, consarn it!'
Of course, as a reason to let Belvera go, this makes no sense. I love my sister, but if she deliberately set loose a monster that could destroy all life on Earth, I might want to see her locked up, or at least under psychiatric care. The real reason she gets let go is to have a sequel-although they could have her imprisoned, and then escape, and still have a sequel.
Of course, that would have required that some thought be put into this film...*
One more thing: in what I think is a movie first, we actually see someone using Windows on a computer. This probably means that Apple's subsidiary in Japan doesn't hand out laptops to Toho, unlike in the US, where Apple will stick a Mac in just about anything put on the silver screen. For those of us who use other operating systems, this is proof that Dad's company is evil: they're running Windows, which is prety much the sign of the beast.
* People in this film act like they've never even heard of Mothra-given that Mothra trashed Tokyo in a fight with Battra and Godzilla a few years back (in Godzilla vs. Mothra) you'd think they'd remember. Go back!
* Ever notice how Mothra pretty much always seems to be giving birth to eggs and dying? In every film I've seen involving Mothra save Destroy All Monsters, they use this schtick. Either Mothra has the lifespan of a moth, or the writers aren't very original. Two guesses which view I endorse. Go back!
* Some readers may wonder where the other third of a lamp I gave this shambling horror that masquerades as a film came from. It's for Belvera-the character is interesting, and deserves a lot more development than she got. Plus I think she's cute. Go back!
