Was Akira Takarada Originally Supposed To Play Dr. Serizawa? (aka What's Up With Those Still Photos?)

When I read Stuart Galbraith's masterful book Monsters Are Attacking Tokyo!, I came across a quote from an interview the author conducted with Akira Takarada. Takarada mentions that he and Akihiko Hirata were originally cast for each other's roles, with Hirata playing Ogata and Takarada playing Dr. Serizawa. The entirety of the quote goes like this, emphasis mine:

"At the time we had the very controversial news story of the tuna boat that was exposed to radiation. That was a major social issue. The radiation - the sleeping Godzilla - is coming from the deep sea, Honda said. Those were the kind of discussions we had. Akihiko Hirata and I switched roles. Mr. Hirata had more of a scientist-like face - simple as that."

I had no real reason not to accept this until I translated an interview with Ishirō Honda. The book that the interview was included in printed one photo from a series of stills of Hirata in what appears to be a student uniform, no eyepatch, with Momoko Kōchi. When the interviewer brings these stills up to Honda, Honda seemingly denies the story about Hirata originally having been cast as Ogata. Or so I thought at first.

I'm a bit rough on the exact wording due to the machine translation, but the gist of the exchange went like this:

1. The interviewer mentions the photos and asks Honda if this was a scene that was shot for Godzilla and then cut from the film.
2. Honda says no, they were still photographs, and that it was like they were "old lovers".
3. The interviewer brings up the stories about the role switch. (It isn't framed as a question: the interviewer essentially just states "there are stories that Hirata was originally supposed to play Ogata's role.")
4. Honda says "No, that wasn't the case".

So I read this and I immediately thought, "oh, that's interesting". Honda says the role switch didn't happen? But then I realized that there are two ways you could interpret Honda's response of "No, that wasn't the case":

1. No, Hirata was never meant to play Ogata's role.
2. No, that wasn't the case for those specific stills. As in, Honda neither confirms nor denies whether Hirata was meant to play Ogata. He just says that isn't what's going on in those stills.

But those stills still bothered the hell out of me.

I thought hard about this. I thought way, way too hard about this. I had been assuming that the uniform in the stills was a university uniform, and that led me to believe the stills did show Hirata playing Ogata, since Serizawa would canonically have been a little young to be in university¹ until the last year of the war or just after it, and we do know that he lost his eye at some point during the war. But I took another look at the interview, and the interviewer is just saying "student clothes", not "university". And so, considering that style of cap was worn by schoolboys from early age up to university, I don't think there's much reason to doubt that the photos are meant to depict Serizawa as a teenager. 

Ed Godziszewski mentions this in his 13-minute featurette on the development of the film's story, and says that there's "conflicting information" about the images, bringing up all possibilities: deleted scenes, promotional still photographs, or photos from the casting process during which time Hirata was slated to play Ogata. 

So it's probably Serizawa in the stills, but what about the switch? Well, we're gonna go back to Godziszewski on this one.

Godziszewski printed a fine article on the development process of Godzilla in issue #12 of G-Fan, which included the most elaborate explanation of Hirata's original casting as Ogata that I have yet found. I would still like to see a Japanese primary source for this, but I respect Godziszewski, and if he says something, I believe it. Also, although the article in G-Fan ran in 1994, it's a reprint of an article from an issue of Markalite that ran in 1981, so we have a source that goes even farther back than the 1985 interview. This is the relevant paragraph of the article in full:

"Director Honda was able to tap a fine cast of actors from the Toho lot. The distinguished and highly respected Takashi Shimura was selected to play the eminent paleontologist Dr. Yamane. Akihiko Hirata was originally selected to play the role of Ogata, but after several screen tests he was deemed unsuitable for the part, instead being given the role of Dr. Serizawa. The handsome young actor Akira Takarada was given the role of Ogata, his good looks more appropriate to a romantic lead."

I'll go ahead and keep my mouth shut about that last bit. I also want to note that filming on Godzilla began around the first week of August, which means the casting process was probably underway in July. So... happy 70th anniversary to all that business.

I know that in the end none of this really matters, but it compels me. I am [gestures to blog] slightly biased, I admit, but the fact that Hirata absolutely nailed that role is an objective truth, evidenced by Dr. Serizawa's lasting impression not only on the Godzilla franchise even up to its American MonsterVerse iterations but also on movies that have nothing to do with Godzilla - Pacific Rim and its "Serizawa scale", for instance. I dearly love Akira Takarada, but I think Hirata was the natural choice for that role: not only had he been acting for slightly longer than Takarada, but he had also shown, in films like Farewell Rabaul and Tetsuwan Namida Ari, that he could convey a character's internal strife very well.

And it's crazy to think that the role of Serizawa as we know it today almost just kind of... wasn't.

____

^{1 This in and of itself is interesting and somewhat convoluted. If we assume that Serizawa is 27 when Godzilla takes place in 1954, as canonically stated, and that he lost his eye at some point during the war, it would mean that, if he were a veteran, he would have been in the military - presumably in active combat - in his late teens at the oldest. However, aside from early script drafts in which he was planned to be much older (at one point he was 40 and widowed), I cannot recall any finalized material specifically referring to him as a war veteran, so I think it's reasonable to consider the possibility that he could have been wounded as a civilian. My personal theory to explain this slightly iffy timeline is that Serizawa as a character retains some backstory from earlier drafts in which he was written as older, even though his age was shifted down in the final film. This would also negate the theories of him having worked with Nazis during the war as he could not possibly have gotten a university-level education until, again, the last year or so of the war or immediately after it.}

^{2 I cannot add a footnote to a footnote so I will amend the above by clarifying that the only source for placing Serizawa's age at 27 is a Godzilla encyclopedia published in 2004. I have no information on if the entries in this encyclopedia have been confirmed canon by anyone at Toho. I would tend to accept 27 as a reasonable assumption of Serizawa's age for the sole reason that he and Ogata are meant to have been friends since childhood who are around the same age and I highly, highly doubt Toho would have attempted to sell Akira Takarada as any older than 27 (which is already a stretch given that he was actually 19).}

Toho SF Tokusatsu Eiga Series vol. 3 (Godzilla/Varan/Godzilla Raids Again) (1985)

I recently got my hands on something I've wanted for a long time: this gorgeous, very heavy paperback published by Toho as part of a series on their tokusatsu films. This one specifically details the history of Godzilla, Godzilla Raids Again and Varan. Not only does it include extensive film stills and basically entire scripts, it also features interviews with several people, including Ishirō Honda and Akihiko Hirata. (I translated the interview with Honda on my main blog.) This book was published in May 1985 and the interview with Hirata was conducted in March 1984, so around four months before his death. 

I have some qualms about machine-translating an interview, to say the least, but I think that, as long as we all take this for what it is, there's not really anything wrong with me posting it. Just please keep in mind while reading this that a machine translation can't capture the same nuance and accuracy as a translation done by a real human. I'm not claiming that this is even really any good, but it's something. Where applicable, I've used English-language titles for films mentioned within the interview.

image sources: Godzilla 1954 and Son of Godzilla behind-the-scenes

image sources: Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple, Godzilla, Farewell Rabaul, Secret of the Telegian, The Three Treasures, Story of Osaka Castle, Sanjuro, King Kong vs. Godzilla

image sources: Adventure in Kigan Castle, Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster, Atragon, Ebirah, Son of Godzilla, Admiral Yamamoto  

image sources: Prophecies of Nostradamus, The Family, Latitude Zero, Crazy Big Explosion, Terror of Mechagodzilla, The War in Space, The Imperial Navy, Sayonara Jupiter

On to the interview itself. I should note that this book is not the first time this interview was printed: it was conducted by Toshimichi Otsuki as a bonus feature on a vinyl LP put out by King Records that presented a condensed version of Godzilla as a sort of audio drama. (I'd love to get my hands on that but it's expensive, y'all, all this stuff is expensive, I had to get a part-time job.) I'm guessing that's the reason why this interview is not as long as the other two that the book included - it's basically liner notes from an LP.

   This interview was conducted at Akihiko Hirata's home on March 9th 1984 and was effectively his last interview.

   - Mr. Hirata, are there any particular memories you have of your appearance in Godzilla (1954)?

Hirata: Hmm... well, after all, that was the [Lucky Dragon no. 5] incident, just after that. There was still some kind of fear associated with the hydrogen bomb test. Then there's anger. First of all, the script really resonated with me and I was impressed by the fact that all of those things appeared in Godzilla. That's why, even though it still has a great reputation, I wonder (strongly) why it didn't have a better reputation back then! Somehow, it seems like it's more valuable now. I feel like at that time it was seen as something of a "monster movie", something light. There is some dissatisfaction with that. After all, the fear and anger towards hydrogen bomb tests and nuclear weapons is something that the critics of the time and others seem to take seriously. Wasn't it? It's not a frivolous thing. Godzilla was good after all. Yeah, I like Godzilla's face. [TL: Same.] Well, I wonder... didn't they make them every time they made Godzilla stuffed animals? [TL: "Stuffed animals" refers to the various puppets and maquettes used in filming Godzilla movies.]

   

   - That's right, Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Again are completely different, and [?] have made almost every movie since King Kong vs. Godzilla. [...]

Hirata: It was definitely scary. I think that fear is what makes Godzilla so appealing.

   - Especially because there were only night scenes.

Hirata: Yes, yes. Well, there are a few scenes where I saw [Godzilla] during the day, but that's okay. At first, I had no idea what Godzilla was like [laughs]... I had no idea what Godzilla looked like when I was filming it. That was really weird.

   - Since this was an unprecedented movie, did you have any difficulties acting?

Hirata: No, it wasn't really a hardship. I was having trouble deciding where to look, because I couldn't grasp the size. I'd say it's roughly 50 meters. Then, when the 50-meter object came close to 100 meters, I had no idea which side I should look at [laughs].

   - In Godzilla, you played the role of Dr. Daisuke Serizawa, and although you didn't appear much in the role in the second half, it felt like you were carrying the entire drama. So, what were the difficulties?

Hirata: Well... I guess it means that I, Dr. Serizawa, myself, have been scarred by the war. [Had this] come out as sentimentalism, I thought it was boring. I thought it would be nice if something somehow came out. There were scars on his face, including the eyepatch, but they didn't look very noticeable. I couldn't see it.

   - Did that happen during filming?

Hirata: Yes.

   - In the still before the crank-in, there is one that appears in Katsuaki. [TL: Is this referring to the deleted scene where Ogata and Emiko see what they think is some driftwood, but is actually Godzilla? I don't know.]

Hirata: However, when it became a movie, it was almost shocking. Hmm, well, I can't say I'm near-acquainted, to use today's terms. I thought it would be boring it if became too much of a joke, but after  watching it, it's really a joke. By all means [laughs].

   - Godzilla emerged as a coagulation of the negative aspects of human civilization, such as nuclear tests, and in the same way, I believe that Dr. Serizawa carries the negative aspects of humankind. I'm trying to keep this in mind, but if it were to act solely on instinct like Godzilla, I think that the Oxygen  Destroyer could become the second Godzilla...

Hirata: Yes, that's right, that's right.

    - If we make a mistake in using science for peaceful purposes, it can turn into a deadly weapon. I think this is a movie that depicts that aspect.

Hirata: Well, Dr. Serizawa didn't have many lines, right? He didn't say much. I think that was good for me. What if Dr. Serizawa were to say everything and do things like solve riddles? I think this is already flimsy and boring. I think that is also a good point of the original work, or rather the screenplay.

   - Takashi Shimura fills in that part.

Hirata: Yes, yes, yes. Well, he never made excuses or anything like that for his actions. It's shown through actions. That's why, even as a drama, [he] is a great person. I think so.

   - At that time, [the] focus was on [special effects].

Hirata: Yes. As for the drama part, it [felt] like it [was] kind of... worthless, which is strange, but it's rather weak that way. [TL: I'm making an assumption that this is intended to be in the past tense.]

   - The special effects were so amazing that I couldn't help but notice them...

Hirata: [...] That's what we thought at first, too. After all, you'll want to watch it after ten or twenty years... "Oh!" The drama part is very well drawn. I slowly watched it on video the other day. Especially when I watch it on a small video screen, I tend to be more interested in the drama than the special effects. I thought, "Ah, the drama is really well done" and "the people are portrayed very well". As expected, Dr. Serizawa is the best drawn. And Dr. Yamane... I didn't understand that when I was doing it. However, in a strange way, I was trying not to make it look tragic, but I do remember that.

   - Mr. Hirata, you have appeared in many other Godzilla series films besides Godzilla, are there any other works besides the first that remain in your heart?

Hirata: A special effects movie?

   - Yes.

Hirata: Rodan, right?

   - It's Sora no Daikaijū Radon. [TL: I've kept the original title of the film here, since in English both Rodan the monster and Rodan the movie have the same name. Hirata is saying "Rodan" as in the monster and Otsuki responds with the full title of the film.] Godzilla gradually became an ally of justice in later years.

Hirata: Yes, yes. He would have become an idol. That's boring, isn't it?

   - It was a symbol of fear and terror.

Hirata: [TL: I've tried translating this passage several times and it's just not coming out coherent. It's something about how Godzilla or kaiju in general will always be humanity's enemies?] It has to be that way.

   - Godzilla doesn't have to be evil.

Hirata: Well, even the look of [Godzilla's] face has changed.

   - It's become cute.

Hirata: Yeah, he's charming. Son of Godzilla was really funny [laughs].

   - The direction is a little...

Hirata: No, that's why, as a service, it's okay to make something like that once in a while, especially for the children. After all, the essence of Godzilla is that he's the embodiment of evil. That's why Godzilla... that horror, Mechagodzilla, etc, came out as a [machine]. That kind of thing is boring after all. Godzilla is a living thing, and it wouldn't be interesting unless it was a slimy creature.

   - This is a creature that has lived forever, since ancient times, but what would happen if it appears in reality? Nearly ten years after the war, [the town?] finally recovered. What will happen? There is that fear of having your daily life disrupted.

Hirata: Well, at that time, it was just a period of recovery to some extent. Maybe it's the fear of it being destroyed, or maybe it's [interest]. Now, in a world that has achieved such rapid growth, especially in Japan, there are so many questions like "What if Godzilla shows up here again?" and "What will happen if Godzilla destroys it?" It's now becoming a big topic of interest.

   - It will be. I'm particularly interested in what would happen if a building in the Shinjuku subcenter collapsed.

Hirata: Especially young people today have no idea that Tokyo, or even Japan, was in ruins. People who don't know about war, I'm sure such people are interested. I don't think we would ever want to see it become a ruin again.

   - Apparently Toho is making a new Godzilla movie.

Hirata: It seems so. Hmm, I guess it's the allure of destruction that comes with Godzilla, and I feel like young people today are looking for something like that. [TL: It's possible - though unlikely - that he knew he was supposed to be in the new Godzilla movie at this point but just wasn't saying anything; according to Kenji Sahara he "never leaked gossip to the press". Note also that when production of Return of Godzilla was announced, it was Hirata who broke the news officially.]

   - I agree. The generation below us doesn't know about the Vietnam War or the [student protests]. There is no sense of crisis about destruction.

Hirata: Not really. If you're in a safe zone and that happens, you probably have a strong desire to see[...]

   - I really like an objective, third-party perspective. That's why there's a huge Godzilla boom right now, and there's a reason for this. Do you think so?

Hirata: There's definitely the influence of American movies. Isn't it? Star Wars or Close Encounters of the Third Kind. That kind of thing was very well received. "Japan can't do it, you can't make something like that. It can't be possible." A kind of nationalist righteousness... I don't think so [laughs]. I wonder what it is. "Even Japan can do this!" That's right. There must be something wrong with that.

   - Well, the fact that such a work [was created] 20 or 30 years ago is what makes it so strong. How do you feel about not appearing in Sayonara Jupiter? [TL: Not sure what this means since he was definitely in the movie, it seems like they may just be talking about how he didn't get a lot of scenes.]

Hirata: Well... well, I didn't appear very often. For me, it's a special effects movie after all, but it's a story set in the near future.

   - Yes.

Hirata: It's a possibility in the near future, 150 years from now. Well, 150 years from now, I won't be able to experience it myself. I think it was good to experience what humanity, the Earth, and the universe will look like 150 years from now. If anything, I prefer monster stories, especially more than [photography?]. I feel like I'm watching a TV game [laughs].

   - In the past, we tried to make it look real by hanging [props] with wire and making [them] fly. It feels like they used computers in Star Wars movies to guarantee that they would be able to make pictures like this.

Hirata: Well, everything has already been calculated. It's like the movie was already made before it was even made. You can predict everything, right? I think this is boring. After all, it's handmade. A monster comes out, and then you wonder if it's going to the right or the left. After all, you won't know until you take the picture. It's a work that has some aspects that are still unknown. It's more interesting the way it is.

   - I agree. When you see [Mt. Aso] exploding and Rodan falling down while burning, you can really feel the passion of the people who made it. You can see that they are making a movie by hand, like making cloth or weaving. When it comes to video production or computers, it feels like something is missing.

Hirata: When a monster appears, there is something romantic about it. [TL: I would get this quote tattooed on me.]

   - You could call it nostalgia for things you haven't seen yet.

Hirata: Yeah, yeah. It's this mushy thing that humans naturally have. Something unknown, an unknown fear. That sort of thing is, after all, symbolized by monsters. That's what makes it so appealing. That's why, whether it's Star Wars or Close Encounters of the Third Kind, it's always interesting to see alien-like characters appear.

   - I agree. Over there, mold technology and special makeup are highly developed. It would be interesting to develop that further.

Hirata: Yes, yes. Have you seen Sayonara Jupiter?

   - No, I haven't seen it yet.

Hirata: Yeah, I haven't seen it either. Well, it seems like special effects and things are going very well. So, I guess that's what it is. If anything I prefer special effects movies that feature monsters.

   - I guess everyone likes monsters themselves. Would you say it's a strange thing?

Hirata: That's why, because I like things like that, there are a lot of fairy tales and commercials with monster motifs coming out these days. The reason something like that gets such a good reputation is because it's a romanticism toward monsters, because everyone has that sort of thing. Right?

   - It is said that romance has disappeared in modern times. I guess that's why everyone is interested in Godzilla and other monsters.

Hirata: In the human world, the drama is thin. It's on the rise, isn't it?

   - Oh yes.

Hirata: That's why it's so much more about monsters and things like that. Isn't that what you're looking for?

   - Thank you very much.

____

Here are some other bonus pictures from the book.

Akihiko Hirata dressed as a Shintō priest and Momoko Kōchi as a shrine maiden, from a "Godzilla Festival" on October 25, 1954, after filming was completed. I've seen this picture floating around and always wondered what the context was.

The top middle and bottom middle photos are stills related to Godzilla that do not appear in the film. Honda was asked in an interview if these were scenes that were shot and then deleted, but he claims that they weren't, and were simply still photographs. The bottom right is just a random picture from Varan I guess.

You can see some more of these stills here. The OP theorizes that these could have been promo stills from when Hirata was slated to play Ogata, but I tend to disagree with that, considering that we have conflicting information about whether or not that was ever actually the case. I could totally be wrong, though.

...but you bet we're gonna go down a rabbit hole about this.

クレージーの無責任清水港 / [Kureji no] Musekinin Shimizu Minato / The Boss of Pick-Pocket Bay

Release date: January 3, 1966

Director: Takashi Tsuboshima

Studio: Toho

Cast: Hitoshi Ueki, Kei Tani, Hajime Hana, Hiroshi Inuzuka, Reiko Dan, Mie Hama, Jun Tazaki, Yū Fujiki, Akihiko Hirata, Senri Sakurai, Etaro Ishibashi, Yoshio Tsuchiya, Shin Yasuda, Noriko Takahashi, Ikio Sawamura et al.

Availability: Available as a DVD on amazon.jp; also streaming on Amazon Prime Japan. No known internet streaming outside of Japan.

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This was apparently a film with no small amount of production trouble. According to Japanese Wikipedia¹:

• The director was essentially handed a script and told "here, shoot this, the staff are already preparing to work on it". This initial script that Tsuboshima was given only covered a single scene in the film.
• Crazy Cats' schedule was so tight at the time that production was cut down to 20 days, from an average of a little over a month.
• Because the initial script was so fragmented, new scenes would be delivered at start of shooting each day, but the final part of the script did not arrive until a week after shooting had wrapped.
• When this final script was delivered, it was realized that Hiroshi Inuzuka, who was supposed to be in the film, had not had a role written for him. His role was therefore created in great haste and with a reused costume. (I've heard that this was only a rumor, but I believe it comes from the director himself.)
• The reason for the title dropping the typical "Kureji no" format that all other Crazy Cats movies have was also due to the rushed script; during production, the director did not know what the film's official title was. Staff only realized the title was missing "Kureji no" at the film's preview.

Even for Toho, that sounds like sheer chaos.

Hitoshi Ueki plays the film's main character, Sangoro. He narrates the opening of the film and he is a bit of a braggart. He declares himself the sexiest man in Japan, like "Mt. Fuji made into a man". He then gets chased up a tree by a random dog. Moving quickly on, he stops at a restaurant, nearly eats them out of house and home, then tries to pay with basically an IOU, and gets in a fight with the owner (Ikio Sawamura!). They chuck him in prison, where he gambles recklessly with the other inmates.

this was post-song and dance sequence

I have to admit, I'm having a really hard time writing this, because nothing actually happens in this movie. It's just kind of, like, Sangoro trying to get meals for free, going to jail, escaping jail, deciding he likes jail, trying to get back into jail, running afoul of Jirocho's guys, running afoul of the guys who hate Jirocho's guys, getting into fights, ad nauseam. You know how they say "this meeting could have been an email"? This movie could have been a comedy routine. There is virtually no plot.

Akihiko Hirata's character is credited as "taisē" (something like "chief officer") with no given name mentioned, but according to Wikipedia he is playing Masagoro Yamamoto, also known as Omasa, who was a real person that served under Jirocho. You can read about him (and even see his picture!) here. Hirata is not in this very much but that is par for the course.

Kei Tani plays Ishimatsu, who was also (maybe) a real person; my favorite Ishimatsu is and will always be Hibari Misora.

Were this not a Crazy Cats movie, Toho would have had the opportunity to do something REALLY funny with the casting for Ishimatsu here

Almost the weirdest part of this is when Yū Fujiki comes in and plays it completely straight. (Well, almost completely straight. Sangoro nut-shots him.) 

This is also where there starts to kind of, sort of be some plot happening (almost 45 minutes into the movie): Fujiki's character, Genba, was bodyguard to the Takaoka family, who sought to wipe out Jirocho (played by Hajime Hana) and his men, but after Sangoro whomps him, he returns to his boss, Kansuke (Somemasu Matsumoto), and admits defeat, promising to find a better bodyguard than himself. His replacement is a swordsman named Hayato, played by Jun Tazaki. Two new players also enter the scene: Seiji and Shinsuke, played by Etaro Ishibashi and Shin Yasuda.

It turns out that Seiji and Shinsuke have a grudge against Hayato for having killed people close to them, so they challenge him to a fight in the middle of a festival. These people know Sangoro and so he reluctantly defends them, but it turns out Hayato doesn't actually want to kill him, so they stage a mock fight for the large crowd that has accumulated. Sangoro "wins" and is feted by all.

Bin Furuya sighting

The film builds ("builds", it happens in about five minutes) to a climax in which Jirocho's clan and the Takaoka clan mount a huge fight outdoors. Sangoro shows up in the middle of it, and the heads of both clans decide that the outcome hinges on him. Sangoro opts to voluntarily give his life to de-escalate the conflict, so the two families put him in a barrel and chuck him into the ocean. Like everything else he's done, this is, of course, a ruse. Sangoro escapes and crashes his own funeral, is thanked by Jirocho's family for his help, and the film ends.

I can tell this would have been a really good movie if it hadn't been so rushed. From a technical standpoint, this is probably one of the worst Toho movies I've seen, but it's still really obvious that the talent is there. This is just what happens when you put a bunch of people who are generally good at making movies on such a tight schedule that the end product suffers for it. Also, for such a slapdash movie, the sets are surprisingly nice. I have a feeling they probably reused them from something else.

And: Hitoshi Ueki carries literally this entire film. This is his thing. If he wasn't so dynamic and fun to watch, this would have been a non-starter. The other Crazy Cats (sans Inuzuka, who appears in only one scene) are there too, but it is his character that makes this worthwhile at all. Both Ishimatsu and Sangoro have romantic interests, played by Mie Hama and Noriko Takahashi; I didn't mention them because even though both actresses are always fun to see, their roles here are very forgettable. There is a sequel to this which I will be covering at some point; hopefully it's a little more fleshed out.

I'd really recommend scrolling through the reviews of this film on Kinenote, especially the long one at the bottom. The people there talk about it much more fairly than I could do while viewing it with machine-translated subtitles.

____

¹ Sourced from Tsuboshima's audio commentary on the 2006 DVD release.

クレージーの大爆発 / Kureji no Daibakuhatsu / Crazy Big Explosion (1969)

Release date: April 27, 1969
Director: Kengo Furusawa
Studio: Toho
Cast: Hitoshi Ueki, Kei Tani, Hajime Hana, Hiroshi Inuzuka, Senri Sakurai, Ētarō Ishibashi, Shin Yasuda, Noriko Takahashi, Ayumi Ishida, Akihiko Hirata, Kirin Kiki, Makoto Fujita et al
Availability: Available as a DVD on amazon.co.jp; also available via streaming on Amazon Prime with a Japanese Amazon account. No known internet streaming outside of Japan.

____

I've really been looking forward to this one. Who doesn't like a movie literally called "Crazy Big Explosion"?

This is part of the long-running Crazy Cats film series, starring the jazz band phenomenon Crazy Cats (sometimes "Hajime Hana and Crazy Cats"). It's far from the most obscure film I've covered here, and Crazy Cats in general remain well-known today.¹ Wikipedia - as in English Wikipedia - even had an article about Crazy Cats featured in their "did you know?" section a few months back. And yet, to my knowledge, absolutely none of the Crazy Cats films have ever been subtitled or are even really known about outside of Japan.

Crazy Big Explosion has got some appeal for tokusatsu fans, as this was Teruyoshi Nakano's first credit as special effects director, and Kengo Furusawa would later helm episodes of Zone Fighter. It's also got a basis in real history - it's one of many films based on the "300 Million Yen Robbery", one of the most famous robbery cases in Japan, in which a still-unknown perpetrator, disguised as a motorcycle cop, successfully robbed a bank of three hundred million yen in employee bonuses. (The employees were, surprisingly, fine: all the money was insured.)

As always, all images are copyright Toho. I claim no ownership. I'm just the freak who likes taking screenshots.

The film sets up the plot with a narration explaining how Japan, as of the present time, has become the #2 economy in the world and is so financially prosperous that it is now being targeted by GIB, an international underground criminal organization. GIB knows of a cache of gold bars hidden underneath Sanichi Bank, and their plan is to recruit civilians to steal it, so that nothing about the crime can be traced back to GIB.

Hirata's character shows up surprisingly early on in the film. He plays sort of a GIB middle-manager named W, who calls the shots for the agents operating under him, but ultimately reports back to a shadowy, unseen big boss. He speaks a little English.

One of GIB's agents, going by the name of Eriko, fakes a car accident to get her mark - a sophisticated criminal named Oki (Hitoshi Ueki) - to take her back to her apartment so she can loop him into the plan. She shows him some footage of a previous bank job he'd done and tells him how impressed she was - this job is actually the 300 Million Yen Robbery, which the film posits that Oki was the perpetrator of! Oki had been using the gold to finance his strange modern religious movement, and agrees to help Eriko with the new job.

peak 1960s

also, am I crazy or is this the harem room set from Adventure in Kigan Castle?

Then we go to the Hanshin-Giants game. 

Meanwhile, Hajime Hana plays Tachibana, a man who is about to be evicted with his wife and two kids. His friend Akatsuka (Hiroshi Inuzuka) comes over to tell him he might know of a way to make enough money to pay back the bank and keep his house, and although Tachibana protests at first, he is soon part of the scheme as well. The last person to be read into the plan is Kei Tani's character, Natakani, a dentist whose office is chosen as the perfect spot to begin tunneling under the bank. Along with a bank employee (Matsuda, played by Shin Yasuda) who's willing to act as a mole and give them insider information, the gang's all here.

Obviously digging a tunnel in public makes a lot of noise, so our crims need a cover story. They decide to pretend they're shooting a movie to avoid suspicion. While the guys are underground jackhammering and dynamiting their way into the bank's foundation, Oki and Tachibana are aboveground, "filming" a huge song-and-dance sequence in the streets as a distraction.

Ayumi Ishida is the singer here

This feels like a good time to remind everybody that Teruyoshi Nakano was in charge of special effects for the first time here. Teruyoshi "I wanted to blow the roof off the soundstage but Toho said no" Nakano. There are indeed many explosions in this film.

The gang gets word that the gold bars are about to be moved ahead of schedule, so they have only a few hours to complete their tunnel and steal the gold. Their explosions in the middle of the night are making the police increasingly suspicious, but finally they break into the safe where the bars are, and set up a chute system to start funneling them out. The police are there at this point, but it looks like the Crazy Cats are going to get away - until Eriko radios for backup from GIB, who hold the Cats up at gunpoint and steal the gold bars for themselves. W also calls in a tip to the police, telling them Oki and co. are the robbers.

The other GIB agent Eriko called for backup ends up betraying her, telling her that when their patsies are captured, they'll surely tell the police about her, and that will endanger the whole of GIB. He throws her out of their truck and apparently shoots her, but she survives due to having stashed a gold bar in her bra(!). She joins back up with the Crazy Cats who are now being hotly pursued by the police.

cop car demolition derby at the cheapest filming location in town, everybody's invited

Our crew then steals GIB's jet which happens to be carrying a hydrogen bomb. This they accidentally crash into the foot of Mt. Fuji, attracting the attention of the military and then of the press, who hail them as revolutionaries or something, and then the Prime Minister, who is very enthused with the idea of getting some H-bombs himself. This is not brought up again. 

GIB catches up with the crew eventually and kidnaps them back to their base, which they plan to blow to smithereens using another H-bomb (Jesus, how many did they have?) and then evacuate with the gold in their cool secret rocket.

This of course fails. W gets shot pretty unceremoniously, the base explodes anyway, and Crazy Cats steal the rocket. The narrative peaces out beyond this point; movie's over, stop thinking about logic or the fact that everybody is stuck in space. It's fine. Don't worry about it.

GORATH CAMEO

The film ends with another song-and-dance number on the moon. This was evidently the last Crazy Cats film to feature a full song-and-dance sequence with the whole band, which is too bad; this was my first real Crazy Cats experience, but they all seem like great entertainers.

Yeah this was the stuff. A goofy-ass robbery-gone-wrong movie with tokusatsu sensibilities and excellent music and cinematography. I can't say there were any specific jokes that really got me (except when Nakatani calls his landlord ojisan and the landlord says "I’m only 38!") but the overall vibe is just total silliness. Crazy Cats obviously work really well together as a troupe, and the fact that everybody watching would have already known they were a band saves the film a lot of time it might otherwise have to spend on character development. This is just the start of my Crazy Cats journey; more to come in future.

I'm queuing this up to post on July 4th so my American readers can enjoy some explosions of our own as an appropriate soundtrack.

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¹ CAST, who are better known for their extensive line of resin ornaments, produced two ornaments related to Crazy Big Explosion (see 'em both on Mandarake here.) You can also find a CAST GIB emblem for sale on Yahoo! Auctions, so you can buy it and enjoy having everybody tell you "hey, nice Shocker emblem!"