Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		2.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		3.5

Destroy All Monsters Blu-ray Movie Review

Beware all kitsch!

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 6, 2011

How can you not love a film that has every mutant Japanese monster ever created (or at least most of them) in one all-star, singing and dancing extravaganza? Okay, forget the singing and dancing part, but you get the idea. Destroy All Monsters is a goofy-wonderful 1968 offering from Toho Studios, those thoughtful, introspective people who gave us Godzilla, Mothra, Rodan and (King) Ghidora, The Three-Headed Monster, not to mention a rather large coterie of second string behemoths like Gorosaurus, Manda, Minilla, and Baragon (I’m quite sure there are others, but it’s so hard to keep track when your city is being demolished by giant dinosaur feet). These mutant monsters are known as kaiju in Japan, and Destroy All Monsters is often thought of as the be-all, end-all of kaiju films, and perhaps not just for the reason that it proffers, in the words of the excellent commentary included on this Blu-ray, a “Justice League” of sorts of every major kaiju star of the preceding couple of decades. This was one of the final films of Ishiro Honda, the iconic Japanese director who gave us the first Godzilla, as well as Mothra and numerous other kaiju movies, and many fans consider Destroy All Monsters to be Honda’s magnum opus. Now all of this may lead some to assume that Destroy All Monsters is some kind of undiscovered masterpiece, the Citizen Kane of kaiju films. While it’s hard for me to burst that bubble, the fact is Destroy All Monsters is silly, hyperbolic and just flat out funny at times (unintentionally, one hopes). But it’s also suffused with a certain kind of childlike wonder that no doubt appealed to both Japanese and American kids at the time of its release. (The film was licensed by American-International, that arbiter of the truly classy in United States movies, and released here in an English dub some time after the original Japanese exhibition). There’s something immensely appealing about seeing a guy in a big rubber dinosaur costume traipsing through what is obviously a miniature of a major metropolis, smashing just about everything in sight, and if that is your kaiju cup of tea, you’ve arrived at the right movie.

Did Michael Crichton see Destroy All Monsters when he was a kid, and did it plant a seed in his subconscious that flowered into Jurassic Park? There are certainly some interesting analogs, to be sure. Just as in Crichton’s novel, our gigantic monsters are relegated to an island which is also replete with a high tech laboratory meant to keep tabs on the beasts. And like in Jurassic Park, the island suffers a communications breakdown, finding itself isolated from the outside world. Of course Destroy All Monsters is to Jurassic Park what a kiddie cartoon is to a big budget summer blockbuster, both literally and figuratively. Destroy All Monsters was obviously done in the pre-CGI age, one with practical effects which may strike some jaded contemporary viewers as being laugh out loud hilarious, while others will surrender to the effects’ inherent, albeit often simplistic, charms.

Destroy All Monsters sports a typically silly plot line (could it be otherwise with lots of large rubber monsters trouncing major metropolises worldwide?), including a band of female aliens called Kilaaks (who are eerily reminiscent of the female superspies of Z.O.W.I.E. in In Like Flint) who have taken over mind control of the beasts in order to further their (proto-feminist?) ways. It’s hard to seriously inject a subtext into this film, which frankly is nothing but surface, but is it mere coincidence that men are shown oogling and catering to “ordinary” Japanese women while the Kilaaks are about to prove how worthless Mankind as a whole is?

There’s just something so crazily bizarre about Destroy All Monsters that it’s hard not to love the film, despite its lo-fi ambience. Kids raised on nothing but the shiny perfection of CGI are probably going to be nonplussed by a guy in a giant rubber outfit whose zipper is clearly visible, but for those of us who grew up in times when special effects may have been primitive by today’s standards but somehow seemed more, well, special, there’s an ineffable magic to the patent silliness of all the Godzilla films. This was the last film that featured the collaboration of the “big four” craftsmen of the original Godzilla (due for a deluxe Criterion release on Blu-ray soon), namely director Honda, special effects supervisor Eiji Tsuburaya, composer Akira Itukube and producer Tomoyuki Tanaka. As Steve Ryfle and Ed Godziszewski mention in their superb commentary, time was working against these four, and not just because of their advancing age. The market had changed drastically in Japan, and the allure of kaiju films had lessened considerably from its heyday in the fifties and even early sixties. Destroy All Monsters may in fact be the swan song of the entire genre, which makes its all-star appeal all the more special.

Destroy All Monsters Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Destroy All Monsters is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Media Blasters with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.41:1. While information online is spotty and Media Blasters didn't provide any press releases with their screener, a helpful Blu-ray.com member has insisted that this new release comes from an HD master, though results are highly variable, to say the least. Colors are fairly listless throughout, with fleshtones barely registering at times and the overall palette looking kind of drab. The biggest complaint most videophiles will have with this release is its general fuzziness, a softness which runs virtually from the first frame to the last. There are some notable exceptions, particularly a couple of extreme close-ups of human faces that finally pop with a little high definition detail. And truth be told the print here is generally free of damage, with only a couple of blemishes dotting an individual frame or two. I owned an old DVD of Destroy All Monsters years ago, and I would say that this has perhaps marginally better clarity but certainly nothing like what would be evident from either better source elements.

Destroy All Monsters Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There's much better news with regard to Destroy All Monsters' audio options. Though it may not be clear from the specs above, there are actually two English dubs included, both in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. I am the first to admit I am not the "Godzilla scholars" the commentators are advertised as being on the back cover of this Blu-ray, but my assumption is that the first, much better sounding dub, might be from the International version and the second one is the American-International Dub, (something confirmed by a helpful Blu-ray.com member). The second English dub is noticeably compressed sounding (even in its lossless iteration) and sports considerable damage along the way, with pops, cracks and even weird splices that leave syllables overlapping at times. The original Japanese track is presented in both DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 and a decent Dolby Digital 5.1 surround mix. The better English DTS track and the Japanese DTS track really have surprisingly fulsome low end, with some great LFE along the way, and both sport excellent fidelity. I frankly gave up on the second English dub after a while due to its much spottier audio quality and the abundant damage it contains.

Destroy All Monsters Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Image Gallery (SD; 19:55)
• Production Art & Storyboards (SD; 4:20)
• Promo Reel (SD; (9:45) is a really fun collection of international trailers as well as some radio spots which sound like they're voiced by none other than Laugh-In's Gary Owens.
• 8mm Films (SD; 7:29) is a weird amalgamation of what looks like old American-International trailers for the film.
• English Commentary. This is an amazing commentary by Steve Ryfle and Ed Godziszewski, co-authors of an upcoming book about Ishiro Honda. The fact that these two know so much about Destroy All Monsters may be a bit humorous to some more cynical types, but their love for the film and for Honda's oeuvre shines through wonderfully on this piece. They deal with a lot of subjects here, including Toho's long history with kaiju films, Honda's background and the technical aspects of Destroy All Monsters' many special effects.

Destroy All Monsters Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Destroy All Monsters is one of those films whose fans seem to know about its intrinsic silliness and even wackiness, but who love it perhaps not in spite of those traits, but because of them. Sure, one can pontificate about the Japanese psyche's penchant for allegorizing the horrors of the Atomic Bomb (and in fact I've done so myself) with regard to the whole kaiju phenomenon, but that misses the salient point of most of these films: they're just flat out escapist fun. The image quality on this new release leaves a lot to be desired, but the great selection of audio options and some fantastic supplements may help to ease fans' pain. With the major caveat of image quality taken into consideration, this release comes Recommended.