The X from Outer Space (1967)

A mission to Mars brings back to Earth a strange spore that grows into a giant chicken monster that subsequently goes on a rampage. Director Kazui Nihonmatsu treats the gloriously ludicrous premise with astonishing ham-fisted sincerity and seriousness, thereby giving this gut-busting campfest the essential lovably wrongheaded appeal it needs to qualify as an absolute hoot and a half. Moreover, the chintzy (not so) special effects possess a certain endearingly rinky-dink charm, with the titular gigantic chicken beast rating as simply sidesplitting sight to behold. Better still, the sequences with this goofy behemoth committing all kinds of nasty havoc definitely deliver the stirring mondo destructo goods. Extra kudos are in order for the groovy theme song and garish widescreen color cinematography. A total kitschy blast.

Mexico has its Masked Wrestlers and Japan has its Rubber-Suited Monsters vs The Toys.What makes this one Different, or as Different as these Things can be, is that here We have some Space Travel, UFOs (Flying Saucer/Omelette), a Tall Blonde Japanese Astronaut/Scientist, and a Bobble-Headed Antenna Alien the Size of, well Godzilla.The Laughs come Fast and Everyone Enjoying this Hootenanny have Their Favorite Lines, Scenes, and Absurdities. The Music for Example has Many "Fans". The Trampoline Mars Surface Dance also gets some Ink.But here's one that doesn't get Mentioned that often...How about that Great Scene with the Wall Map and the Very Serious Guy on the Mobile Ladder that moves the Refrigerator Monster Magnet around as the Havoc Ensues with Radioactive Cloud Bursts Trailing in His Wake. Priceless.Overall, as Hilarious as these Japanese Monster Movies are (almost ALL of them), it should be Pointed Out that these Genre Giants Made Money in their Day and were mostly "In Production" for Decades and are Still Talked About with Unbridled Enthusiasm (Criterion) Today.Above Average because it is Absolutely Absurd as many of the Type are Only just Absurd.Note...If you get bored...count the number of times AAAA-B-Gamma is said...You'll need a clicker.

If you're heavily into monster movies(Godzilla,King Kong,Gamera etc.),then you're going to love this much overlooked classic. This was my first monster movie,ahoy precious childhood memories,and it still looks amazing.That's it if you like men dressing up in rubber suits and stomping buildings,fighting military aircrafts and so on. And yeah,sweet space images,some "atmospheric",groovy music...this one has it all! Guilala(the monster) rocks!Some astronauts on a space mission,stumbles upon some mystic "space spores/egg" - and surprise,surprise - bring it back to earth for further investigation.Guess what happens? Some gigantic monster is on the loose. Now if there only was a sequel...please,please!

These are some of the lines that actress Peggy Neal has to utter in this silly Japanese monster flick. Story is about a team of astronauts that are to be sent to Mars because the previous ships that went have not reported back and they think it has something to do with the UFO activity in the area. The team of astronauts are led by Capt. Sano (Toshiya Wazaki) and one of his crew members is an American biologist named Lisa (Neal) and she is in love with Sano but Sano has a girlfriend Michiko (Itoko Harada) and she works at the lunar station on the Moon. While in space the ship encounters UFO's but they also discover some sort of growth on the outside of the ship. They collect what looks like an egg and bring it back to Earth. While this egg sits in a lab something happens to it and a creature hatches out. It grows to enormous size and it feeds on nuclear energy. It can spit out fire balls and goes on a rampage across Japan. They figure out that a certain element can stop it and they load up the missile's and send out the jets. This film was directed by Kazui Nihonmatsu and the first 30 to 45 minutes I thought that this was a silly but passable sci-fi flick but once the monster gets loose than the silliness goes just as you would expect of these Japanese monster movies. Neal recites lines about how she learned something from the monster but one thing that I found to be the funniest is that her character is suppose to be in love with Wazaki who appears to be even shorter than she is. And he spends the whole film being very stoic and keeping things very professional. I also laughed when the team of astronauts are in space and Neal who is a biologist is still expected to get coffee and hand out meals to everyone. So much for being a biologist! The special effects are pretty bad even by "Mothra" standards and in one scene two people are suppose to be floating while on the Moon but it's obvious that they are jumping up and down on a hidden trampoline in slow motion. The studio brought out the toy tanks and jets and of course when in space you can see the wires. The monster costume is especially laughable and it's kind of a cross between a lizard and a chicken but it has two antenna's on it's head. There is also this spout sticking out of it's forehead and I guess I missed the scene where this was put to use by the monster. I did like the two actress's in the film (Neal and Harada) and in one scene they are both taking a shower and kicking the soap back and forth. This is your typical low budget Japanese monster movie with extremely bad special effects. Like I said, typical!