JLRVancouver Earth has been invaded by duplicitous aliens and all nations must band together to protect our world (and our women)! "The Mysterians" is an excellent example of the creative and entertaining tokusatsu produced by Toho studios in the 1960's. Directed by kaiju perennial Ishiro Honda, with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya and music by Akira Ifukube, the film has a similar look and sound to early Godzilla movies (especially those featuring conniving aliens). The special effects are a mixed bag: the miniatures are excellent (as usual), as are the 'battle scenes' and some of the more exotic sets (the inside of the Mysterians' underground base for example), but most of the optical effects are less effective (you can see through the tanks in some of the battle scenes). As "Godzilla" (1954) had demonstrated the popularity of giant monsters, a huge bird-like mecha (the "Moguera") puts in a brief appearance early in the invasion (belying the Mysterians' later protestations of being a 'peace-loving' people). The suit-mated robot is pretty well done, as is the battle between it and the JDF. I watched a reasonably well dubbed English version of the film, but the acting seemed typical of the genre - fine, but not in particularly demanding roles. All in all, the movie is an entertaining, colourful, and imaginative science-fiction adventure with a charm than is missing (IMO) from the current generation of CGI-based films. Followed by "Battle in Outer Space" (1959), another entertaining Toho space-yarn with similar aesthetics.

Matti-Man Just saw the subbed, widescreen version of this Nipponese classic from 1957. OK, there was no characterisation to speak of. The "hero" and his professor mentor (played by Takashi Shimura, leader of the samurai in SEVEN SAMURAI, by the way) are just cardboard cut-outs serving the relentless, by-the-numbers plot. But the real star of this is the quaint-as-all-get-out vintage special effects.The Toho spfx team were the best. Take a good look at the miniature work in the spectacular flooding scene. This is way better than similar miniature flooding scenes in the far bigger budgeted and later SUPERMAN THE MOVIE (1978), one of the last films to use traditional miniature work.But you just got to love these Mysterians in their elegant colour-coded costumes, and the great design of the alien burrowing machine engine room.So ... not a great deal of sense but a real visual treat. Switch off your brain, sit back and enjoy this madcap, popcorn fest for what it is. Fab, gear and groovy entertainment.

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.

OllieSuave-007 This is one of the earlier sci-fi movies from Toho studios. Respectable Toho actors and actresses are in this movie including Kenji Sahara, Yumi Shirakawa, Momoko Kochi, Akihiko Hirata, and Takashi Shimura-all actors that appeared in the original Godzilla and Rodan movies. This story involves a group of cool looking aliens called the Mysterians, who want to possess a huge chuck of land in Japan and marry Earth women. The suspense builds when the Earth people resists the Mysterians' demands, which results in a battle for Earth action. Just to note, the actor playing the Leader of the Mysterians was Yoshio Tsuchiya. He also played the Vapor Man in 'The Human Vapor,' Controller of Planet X in 'Godzilla vs. Monster Zero,' and Businessman Shindo in 'Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah.'Eiji Tsuburaya's advanced special effects highlighted a spectacular battle of fire, lasers, rockets, tanks and flying saucers between the humans and space aliens. A slow and mysterious, but sometimes militaristic and moving music score by Akira Ifukube. A dramatic and somber story by Takeshi Kimura. Directing was once again done by the great Ishiro Honda.The downside, though, was that the story lacked a solid plot and the female leads weren't emphasized enough. There were too many scenes that depicted meetings held by the officials, discussing what to do about the aliens. These meetings were important in a way, but kind of boring. And, the robot monster, Moguera, was a terrific-looking monster, but wasn't utilized enough. But overall, a pretty cool feature for a sci-fi film made in the 1950s.Grade B