Gorgo

Directed by Eugène Lourié, Gorgo is a co-production of Ireland, the UK, and the US. We're not likely to run across any of these names again in the course of this blog, so let's talked about the movie.

If You Haven't Seen it Before

- Treasure hunters off the coast of Ireland end up in a nearby village to repair their ship.

- While there, the monster Gorgo appears and does some damage.

- The crew decides to capture the big strong Gorgo, as they could make quite a bit of money off such a creature.

- After a risky but successful monster capture, the crew takes Gorgo on exhibition despite some better informed folks advising against it.

- Whoops! Turns out Gorgo is but a baby of its species, and Mama Gorgo emerges from the sea and heads toward London to retrieve her baby.

- Mama Gorgo is attacked by the military and easily survives, sinking an entire destroyer along the way.

- Once it arrives in London proper, Mama Gorgo tears through everything and everyone trying to stop her until she manages to retrieve her child.

- After getting Baby Gorgo back, they leave peacefully.

Kaiju Notes

- From a design perspective, I think Gorgo's design is top notch (especially for the time period). Not entirely reptilian, amphibian, or marine animal, the red eyes also add a lot to an already solid design.

- Gorgo's roar is uninspiring but suitable. They won't get points for trying anything unique or strange, but it works as a scary sound for a big scary creature.

- The best part of Gorgo's design is their giant hands. It's a small touch, but them hands are gigantic for no apparent reason besides ripping things to shreds and I love it.

- Gorgo's mouth and teeth always make it looks like it has a sinister smile when it's not roaring. Again, it's the small details that work and this is another.

Choosing to make Baby Gorgo quite a bit smaller than most other kaiju could initially be read a underwhelming, but is an interesting bit of foreshadowing. Any kaiju movie fan who saw it might think he's quite small and even weak for being captured by a group of regular human jagoffs, but once Mama Gorgo shows up it all makes sense. It's an interesting trick that I appreciate as a little twist that definitely better explains why they were able to both capture the monster but also not contain it, a problem a lot of kaiju movies run into but opt to ignore instead.

The special effects are something to note here, especially in comparison to its Japanese contemporaries. The destruction of London by Mama Gorgo is on par with Japanese movies for at least another 10 years. It's not clear if this is strictly a budget issue or that western audiences are more interested in the detailed destruction, but either way it is worth mentioning. Rather than the almost clumsy way a lot of Godzilla-series kaiju move, Gorgo seems more intentional and we see a few more graphic details of people falling off of bridges or from pieces of buildings Mama Gorgo is holding.

Mama Gorgo also gets credit for staying on target. While she does destroy a few landmarks, this is mostly because they are large and in her way. When there's simply people running away from her she continues walking without slowing down to eat them or terrorize them. Even the military resources she takes down are only because they're trying to stop her, otherwise she's uninterested in anything but Baby. Also she's clearly one of the strongest kaiju we've seen in any movie yet, shrugging off almost everything the military can throw at her and simply walking away when her mission is accomplished. Godzilla himself has been stopped by some of what was thrown at Mama Gorgo and she just walked through it? Could Mama Gorgo beat down Big Daddy G? At this point, one has to assume.

 

Gorgo is, ultimately, a pretty good kaiju flick. On par with any of the other enjoyable-but-2nd-tier films. It does suffer from being really boring in the first half, but makes up for it with some interesting twists and special effects in the second half. With a monster that honestly seems more durable than Godzilla, some good design, and tricks up its sleeve, Gorgo really is a kaiju movie that proves that Japanese studios did not entirely corner the market. It's not likely to change anyone's opinion on the genre, but for fans it's really worth checking out as a vision outside of the innovators at Toho.

Next: Gamera vs. Gyaos!