“Stay tuned in on the civil defense frequency for music and any further developments.”
When we last left Gamera he was on his way to Mars. A meteor collided with the space ship he was on and Gamera is now free. He returns to Japan and destroys Kurobe Dam.
Kano is a WWII vet. During the war he found what he believed was a giant opal. He hid the opal in a cave, on an island in the South Pacific. Now he sends three men, one of them his brother Keisuke, to retrieve the opal. The villagers warn the men not to enter the cave. They go anyway. They find the opal. One man gets stung by a scorpion and dies. The second man, Onodera, being greedy, causes a cave in, and leaves, trapping Keisuke in the cave. Keisuke is rescued by the villagers. They tell him the opal in not really a gem. They want him to take one of the village girls, Karen, back to Japan to try to stop whatever evil they know is going to come.
Believing Keisuke is dead, Onodera travels back to Japan. On the way back the opal is inadvertently exposed to intense ultra violet light. The light reveals that the opal is really an egg. The light incubates the egg and a creature known as Barugon hatches. The creature grows big really quickly and sinks the ship. It then destroys Kobe Harbor and then heads for Osaka.
Barugon is a giant lizard-like creature with a long antler-like spike on his nose and spines running down his back. The spines admit a rainbow ray that destroys whatever it hits. His tongue can jut out and emit a gas that freezes things solid.
Onodera believes the egg is still an opal and is at the bottom of the harbor. He discusses getting divers with Kano to go look for it. When Kano balks, Onodera inadvertently blurts out that he killed two people for it. Kano is outraged that Onodera killed his brother. He attacks Onodera. Onodera kills Kano and his wife to cover up his first crimes. He then goes on to commit more crimes.
Keisuke returns to Japan with Karen. While Barugon wreaks havoc in Osaka Gamera shows up having been attracted by Barugon’s rainbow ray. The two duke it out but Gamera is no match for Barugon’s freezing ray. Barugon goes on to wreak more destruction. The military manages to weaken Barugon, but they have nothing that will kill the monster. Eventually Gamera thaws out and is now thoroughly pissed. When everything the military does fails, it is up to Gamera to destroy Barugon. Or is Barugon too powerful for even Gamera?
“Gamera vs Barugon” AKA” War of the Monsters” was released in 1966 and was directed by Shigeo Tanaka. It is the second movie in the Gamera series. The movie was never released theatrically in the US but was shown on TV. The Japanese version runs about 100 minutes. The US version released as “War of the Monsters” runs about 88 minutes. The minutes that were removed were only scenes where the characters discuss ways to destroy the monster Barugon. The American version is in the public domain.
This film is geared more toward older children and adults. It is the only Gamera movie that did not feature a child as the main human character. There is a good deal of monster blood, although it is quite a bit on the purple side.
There is some stock footage from Gamera in the beginning, but not much. It is also the first Gamera movie in color.