Gorgo

Audience Reviews

View All (90) audience reviews

Karl O A misunderstood metaphor for the tyranny of the British Empire. Where the infant monster represents the Irish Repression by the British, the adult monster represents Mother Irelands rebellion. And her eventual rejection of the stinking invaders. The English may rob the Irish of their heritage (the theft of the creature from the Dublin University) but the thieving English pay in the end. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 06/11/24 Full Review Landen R Though nowhere near as impressive and respected as "Godzilla" (1954), Eugène Lourié's "Gorgo" (1961) is still an entertaining kaiju flick. The low-angled shots and realistic models of various landmarks in London make the destruction scenes extremely satisfactory, giving off the impression that you are watching a giant reptile destroying Big Ben and London Bridge from a street view. Sure, the acting can be hit or miss, and the blue-screen compositing is atrocious, but the film serves its purpose as a nice little B-movie that knows not to overstay its welcome, running just shy of an hour and twenty minutes. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 03/10/24 Full Review Ben T An underrated monster movie that uses London for its story instead of the USA. The special effects are very impressive with a great deal of thought gone into the face of the monster. The miniature set pieces of London are also well made. Unusually, the monster lives in the end as we get to see mother and child leaving London in ruins. Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 02/28/24 Full Review nick s Great effort in production. The storyline seems like a ripoff of King Kong and Godzilla, so zero points for originality. The characters don't add a lot... this is mostly a special effects extravaganza. Unfortunately those effects will look rather comical to a modern audience. Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 10/27/23 Full Review DanTheMan 2 Gorgo is just awesome. Taking elements from Rodan and King Kong resulting in a British homage to Godzilla and other early kaiju classics to deliver a rather beautiful tale enticing both human greed and superstition counterbalanced with some truly exceptional visual effects. Captain Joe Ryan is salvaging for treasure off the coast of Ireland when a volcano erupts, nearly sinking his ship. Ryan and his First Officer and friend, Sam Slade, take the ship to Nara Island for repairs. Before the Harbour Master, Mr McCartin, arrives to assist them, the crew meet Sean, an orphan, who assists McCartin: he invites them to see his collection of ancient Viking relics. Ryan finds himself intrigued by a relic bearing the image of a creature that Sean calls "Ogra, the sea spirit". A creature that Ryan himself just so happens to witness a few hours later and it's far from a legend... After the great success they had distributing Rodan in the United States in 1957, the King Brothers sought to produce a giant monster film of their own. The film was originally intended to be set in Japan as a homage to Godzilla; the setting was then changed to France due to the original Japanese financiers pulling out of production and then finally to the British Isles after a substantial offer from MGM. Southern Australia was also considered for a locale, but the King Brothers supposedly decided that audiences "wouldn't care" if a monster attacked Australia; its alleged lack of worldwide recognisable landmarks for Gorgo to destroy was also cited as a consideration. Gorgo sees the return of director Eugène Lourié for the fourth and final film of his career, he conceived Gorgo as an atonement for his first film, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, as the death of the Rhedosaurus made his daughter cry. His direction is pretty impressive, despite the odd matte shot not quite matching up with his front projection work it's all very spectacular. Especially when you consider that he was opposed to adding a lot of the destruction scenes into the final film. The stock military B-roll doesn't even distract that match and blends fairly well with the actual footage shot for the film since it gives a rather grand scale to the climatic battles with Gorgo despite the clear night and day difference in areas. The film's visual effects are on par with the first Godzilla film if not better in places, the suitmation is excellent giving a great scale to both creatures and the model work by Tom Howard and his crew is genuinely brilliant. The willingness of Mick Dillon and Dave Wilding to fully immerse themselves in the suitmation techniques really lends the set pieces this terrifying sense of realism in places. Honestly, I'd say the weakest part of this film was its characters more than anything, a lot of them are the stock archetypes you'd expect from this type of film but the cast themselves make do with the material and somewhat elevate it in many ways. Despite there being almost entirely no speaking roles for a woman anywhere in this film. Bill Travers and William Sylvester really form the backbone of this film with their seemingly best friend and long time colleague friendship shattering by the end which makes for an engrossing watch when the monsters themselves aren't onscreen. With Vincent Winter portrays a young Irish lad only out to help keep his local legend safe being one of the genre's better "Kenny's". The film's musical score by Angelo Francesco Lavagnino is quite a striking one but not one that lends itself to easy listening all that well, the score was included alongside the director's other work, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms on the compilation album More Monstrous Movie Music. Although these are re-recordings done by Masatoshi Mitsumoto they work a lot better here than Angelo's originals. Overall, Gorgo may present itself as a simple Godzilla knock-off, but actually delivers a rather fantastic spectacle that rivals a lot of the early Shōwa era Toho productions. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/23/23 Full Review Monsol E Yet another Zilla-like. The monster and sets are OK at best. Characters are nonexistent, and story is done to death...but we get to see Britain destroyed, so that's fun! Rated 2.5/5 Stars •  Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 02/09/23 Full Review Read all reviews

Gorgo

My Rating

Read More Read Less POST RATING WRITE A REVIEW EDIT REVIEW

Most Popular at Home Now