“Yongary” Review

I had heard of Yongary several times in the past, but nothing good was ever said about it. “Stay away!” was the motto of fans who had seen it and were warning those of us who hadn’t seen it.

Last fall, I couldn’t take it anymore; I had to see this movie! I had voiced my opinion on this movie several times on previous PXCR episodes. I will say this, despite the score this may receive at the end, I do find this movie to be extremely entertaining in spite of its major flaws.

Let’s start the review off with a synopsis.

Story: As you can see, there isn’t much to this movie. In 1967, this movie was the most expensive movie ever produced in Korea. I am of a mixed bag with the story of this film. One thing, it’s a schizophrenic story that doesn’t know whether it wants to sympathize with Yongary or to create an antagonist in Yongary. This is portrayed, not only in the story structure itself, but also in the characters. An example of this is at the end of the film. As Yongary is writhing on the ground from the precipitate, our characters are smiling and cheering. But right as Yongary is ready to die, Icho begins to feel sympathy for the daikaiju, then after, essentially, being told Yongary was bad, he shrugs off his sympathy then cheers his death.

Another issue is that this story is FILLED with plot holes. How did Icho get to Yongary so fast those two times he visited him? Why in the world is the astronaut’s wife crying that her husband is gone when it only seemed like he was gone for a few hours? How did Yongary get from the hill to the city in one second? The questions go on and on. To try and be blunt, but at the same time polite, this movie isn’t that well made and it shows in many areas.

But the straightforwardness of the story makes it fun. To some extent, the practical effects and it being nothing more than a monster-on-the-loose film that centers around a lot of destruction help the movie become tolerable, if not, enjoyable. You definitely have to turn your brain off when watching this movie.

While the story has many problems, the sheer amount of city destruction helps make up for some of those flaws, so I will give it some benefit of the doubt.

Special Effects:  This is where the movie also has some serious issues. But first, let me applaud the crew in their A-effort in creating exceptional miniatures and, for the most part, matte footage. However, the execution most of the time falls flat.

Yongary’s costume is the highlight outside of the vast array of miniature buildings. The design of Yongary isn’t stellar, but it’s workable and displays flashes of inspiration from Godzilla and Gamera.

The miniature buildings are numerous and very well detailed on the outside. But the collapsing effect isn’t satisfying due to the buildings being hollowed out as well as the obviousness of the buildings being constructed out of plaster and other materials. Not as much detail was put into the collapsing effect here as Toho and Daiei have done with their Godzilla and Gamera properties.

There are several matte paintings that are beautifully done that, I believe, could rival many that were used in the Showa Godzilla era. There was even one painting where it looked like a museum or government building was painted on instead of the production crew creating a miniature of the building. My guess was that it would have been too expensive to produce such a miniature, so they included it in their matte painting.

Those are mostly the bright spots of the effects department. Some of the matte footage was pretty shoddy; most particularly one scene where a military Jeep swerves to avoid Yongary’s foot. Not only is the footage a very faded blue, but Yongary’s lower half is pixelated and inappropriately colored. During this same scene, Yongary cuts the Jeep in half with a laser from his nose horn. As the Jeep falls into two separate pieces, a third wheel is exposed underneath the front half of the vehicle clear as day. This was done, perhaps, for safety purposes.

There is a scene at the beginning of the film with the astronaut and his wife on their honeymoon. The astronaut is sleeping on the porch overlooking the starry sky. The blue matting used to portray the starry sky has very few places where lights were used to represent stars. Otherwise, it’s nothing but a blue matte. The set itself looks very cheap as well and doesn’t pass for, I’m assuming, a honeymoon suite.

Wires can be seen throughout much of the film also and even the flame thrower nozzle can be easily seen when Yongary fires his fire breath.

This is just a sample of the many shortcomings in the special effects department. But I will give them credit where it’s due and the practical effects, I have to admit, helped make the movie enjoyable for me. I still, however, cannot completely overlook some of the glaring effects.

Acting: The actors did fairly well, for the most part, but there wasn’t much in the way of the cast acting in the middle from hyperbole and not acting at all. Much of the time the acting was melodramatic and was downright laughable in some parts.

One of these moments is when the wife is fearing for her husband’s life when he is in space. For one thing, he wasn’t in a lot of danger to begin with. He lost communication with the base and could have, still, returned home safely. The actress is in tears and throwing herself about.

The Icho character is pretty annoying as well. I wanted to punch him in the face through my T.V. screen but found that to be ineffective. Rarely is he ever terrified and I find this to be unbelievable for a boy who is supposed to be 8 years old and hanging around a giant monster.

With the acting not terrible, it is passable.

Battles: There aren’t many battles to speak of. There are a few brief moments when the military engages Yongary, but they’re nothing special.

What makes up for the lack of battles is made up in the large amounts of footage used for “urban renewal.” Yongary’s rampage is a lot of fun to watch and these are the scenes that make the movie very entertaining regardless of technical issues.

These scenes are the bright spots in the movie. If it weren’t for these scenes, this movie would probably receive a much lower score.

Human Drama: Not much here, either. Ilo spends much of his time in a laboratory concocting his precipitate; Icho runs around like The Flash to and from the lab; the main female characters are constantly crying; and the military and government officials stare off somewhere while fulfilling their role of being useless.

There is a romantic story that was developed earlier in the movie, but that story, along with the two characters, are quickly cast aside once Yongary appears. The film could have done so much more, but it attempted to do more, thereby hurting itself.

There is a moment at the end of the film where the characters talk about defeating Yongary. It’s boring. I would recommend stopping the movie after Yongary has officially died, because there is nothing of importance in this final scene. Much of the drama goes nowhere and/or is non-existent.

Overall: As I mentioned above, Yongary isn’t a well made film. It falls flat, or doesn’t show up, in many areas. From a production, and a suspension of disbelief, standpoint, it hurts quite a bit.

But I was able to accept the, pardon my French, crappiness of some of the production of this movie and found myself extremely entertained by it. Out of 10, the movie easily gets 10 out of 10 for entertainment purposes despite its quirks and goofs. I, seriously, have wondered if this movie was supposed to be a comedy with some of the bad acting, weird camera shots, and Yongary dancing at one point. Heck, rectal bleeding makes it into the film (seriously, I’m not kidding).

You’ll find something to enjoy here, whether it’s laughing at the ridiculousness of the movie and its shortcomings, the large amount of city destruction scenes, or both. I find myself a little bit in the middle while leaning more towards enjoying the vast destruction.

I would recommend giving Yongary a try. It’s poorly made, but I did find it entertaining.