JLRVancouver Taken as a Godzilla movie, "Godzilla's Revenge"* is a god-awful collection of clips from earlier films bound together by a tedious story of bullied kid Ichirô (Tomonori Yazaki) being mysteriously transported to Monster Island to hang out with Godzilla's chubby son Minilla. An alternative interpretation is that the tormented child is dreaming about being on the lush Island to escape from his dreary industrial environment, that Minilla is the friend and confidante that he needs to help deal with his tormentors, and that gruff, aloof Godzilla represents absent parents as Ichirô and Minilla learn to deal with the bullying monster Gabara (who is incarnate in both worlds as a mean kid or as a mean monster (the latter with orange hair that brings to mind a certain current world leader)). As discussed in Kalet's "A Critical History and Filmography of Toho's Godzilla Series" the film, 10th in the series, is polarising, some fans and critics deride it as cheaply made franchise-filler while others praise it as a clever and thought-provoking study of growing up during the Japan's 'economic miracle' period. In the latter interpretation, most of the technical problems (e.g. the changing Godzilla suit) that makes the monster scenes so ridiculous can be explained away (i.e. all of the monster scenes are simply imagined by a young fan who is recreating in his mind what he saw in the films), the tedious side-plot about bullies and bank robbers is the actual plot of the film and thus warrants inclusion, and the goofy saurian father-son bonding over radioactive fire is simply the human child's wishful thinking. As a story of how a child's imagination helps him grow up and over-come adversity, the second interpretation is more substantial than the average monster mashup but some people may object to the take-home messages: that to grow up you have to learn to fight back and that bullies will back down when you do (a common and dangerously optimistic fiction). Oddly, at the end of the film, Ichirô pranks an innocent bystander, apparently to impress the bully's gang, suggesting that growing up includes becoming mean-spirited as well as confident. As a monster/horror/sci-fi/camp movie, "Godzilla's Revenge" is watchable only by hard-core fans (who will likely despise it) but as a fable about growing up in which the iconic kaiju characters are stand-ins for childhood fears and hopes, the film rates much higher (albeit from a different audience). *I watched an English-subtitled version, which is supposedly better than the dubbed version.

Michael_Elliott Godzilla's Revenge (1969)** (out of 4) A young Japanese boy is being bullied so in his room he imagines that he's on Monster Island where he's befriended by Godzilla's son while Godzilla himself beats up countless monsters. GODZILLA'S REVENGE is a pretty cheap movie all around as it features footage from at least two other movies but at the same time I think some people are a bit too harsh on it. Yes, if you're expecting a serious or dark Godzilla film then you're certainly not going to find it here but overall I thought the film, while incredibly stupid, at least managed to be fun in a campy way. The film's story is incredibly stupid and rarely makes too much sense as we follow this young kid from his normal life to his imaginary life on Monster Island. The son of Godzilla has to be one of the silliest looking monsters in screen history but at the same time I've always found him rather cute in his own way. The film is certainly aimed towards children and I think on this level it actually works. It's certainly never scary and the monsters are just more charming than anything else. The film contains battle scenes from other movies in the series and while you can make a great case that this here is just cheap, you can also make the case that it's fun to see all the monster fights. The performances are bad as you'd expect and the English dubbing certainly isn't that impressive. The Godzilla suit looks as ridiculous as ever but then again, were they ever really that good? GODZILLA'S REVENGE is a silly little movie that runs a very quick 70-minutes and fans of monster movies should enjoy it.

AaronCapenBanner Tenth Godzilla film is also the worst, an incredibly weak, pointless affair about a bullied Japanese boy who daydreams about hanging out on Monster Island with the son of Godzilla, where they try to help each other overcome their respective bullies...Godzilla does what he can to help. Shamelessly uses loads of flashback footage from previous films in a flimsy and desperate attempt to pass this off as a new story. Subplot with the fleeing crooks is silly and contrived. Film seems confused as to whether or not Godzilla really exists, or is just a movie character, which is bizarre. Worthy message about dealing with bullies is lost by the misguided ending with that poor sign painter!

Eddie Cantillo Godzilla's Revenge (1971)Starring: Eisei Amamoto, Machiko Naka, Haruo Nakajima, Tomonori Yazaki, and Kazuo SuzkiDirected By: Ishiro Honda and Kevin ReynoldsIt looks like Godzilla is raising an army of monster maniacs, oh no wait there not giant monsters it's just a little kid who's a maniac. That's disappointing given the title, I mean Godzilla's Revenge, who'd he get revenge on that's the question you'll be asking yourself by the end of the picture. This was the begging of Godzilla films being for children, and Godzilla being just a regular hero instead of an anti-hero which defeats the purpose of why Godzilla fans watch Godzilla movies.In the movie we see a boy who is a Godzilla fan, he gets picked on by a group of kid's and dreams he's on Monster Island with Godzilla and his son. His parents are always working late, so they barely spend time with him. There's also two bank robbers in the movie, who have stolen a lot of cash. They stay in the abandoned warehouse, were all the kids usually see each other when walking home (yeesh , no one gets dropped off, that's pretty unusual.) The kid falls asleep, and is dreaming that a plane takes him to Monster Island. When he arrives he spots all the monsters, and watches as Godzilla beats up giant Mantises. The boy then finds the son of Godzilla and he quotes "Godzilla say's I should to fight my own battles." There is a new monster in this film who they call Gabera which looks pretty stupid. The boy and the son of Godzilla watches as Godzilla battles some sort of sea creature and Kumonga: the giant spider. The boy goes into the warehouse(even though he's told not too earlier in the film) and picks up one of the bank robbers driver's license. The two bank robbers kidnap the boy and try to use him as a means of escape (even though they could off just as easily kidnap, the boy take the driver's license and left him in the warehouse.) The dream he has with the son of Godzilla fighting Gabera in turn helps him to fight back.You shouldn't naturally care what's going on half the time because, a movie needs characters with conflict and emotional depth. This movie has a little cardboard cutout boy who is just teased for the sake of the plot, and he's a Godzilla fan just for the sake of the plot I mean if I just put this movie in your DVD or BLURAY player and told you this was a Godzilla film you would think I'm lying. Godzilla and his son are only in the film for market value cause in that time in Japan Godzilla made the company lots of money. You would be so bored that you'll be checking your watch and thinking to yourself that this movie feels like three hours, when it's only one hour and ten minutes. There were even more interesting things being said in the film like about the two bank robbers who stole a lot of money, but they weren't shown stealing anything. If they could have shown us that and maybe cops trying to find the boy while Godzilla's fighting Gabera with his son in the city that could have at least been fun.With this Godzilla film Ishiro Honda wanted to make a film for children, but there was no way he could have succeeded with that idea because Godzilla as presented in a few movies is a force of nature or an anti-hero. This movie doesn't completely rape the Godzilla name but it is still not worth any Godzilla fans time. It is one of the worst movie/monster movies a person could ever subject themselves too. I give Godzilla's Revenge a one out of five.