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Fresh and Exciting

Best movie ever!

As Good As It Gets

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

A short, black and white science fiction film dubbed in English, this wacko movie is in fact made up of two episodes of the late '50s Japanese television series SUPERGIANT, the entirety of which has kindly been remastered and given a DVD release by those extraordinary guys working at the wonderful Something Weird Video. For those who don't know, Starman is simply a Japanese variation on Superman, a guy (Ken Utsui) dressed in an unflattering white bodysuit and cape, who wears an antenna on his head to communicate with his pals on the Emerald Planet and uses a special watch to detect radiation! Watching the film play out, one is immediately reminded of the cheap but cheerful American serials of the '30s and '40s and the same atmosphere of excitement and adventure is present in this story.Although aimed at kids and very dated when viewed with a modern eye, ATOMIC RULERS OF THE WORLD is nonetheless a highly engaging experience for those in the right mood. The film is chock-full of fun special effects work depicting Starman flying through the air on his way to fight crime and lots of camera tricks are used to show him flipping through the air or jumping up a height (simply playing the film backwards is a favourite approach here). The storyline involves a bunch of shifty-looking smart-suited bad guys planning to hold Japan to ransom with a nuclear bomb, and of course Starman comes in to save the day.Taking the simple form of the early serial, ATOMIC RULERS OF THE WORLD is episodic in nature, contrasting scenes of plot exposition with tons and tons of ass-kicking action. Starman, an invincible warrior impervious to bullets, gets to battle tons of bad guys back at their remote island base and the lengthy, free-for-all anything-goes fight sequences are invariably entertaining. Along with such action, we get some annoyingly cute Japanese children put into the most terrible peril (hurrah!), a sexy nun, cool music, Herculean bar-bending, one of those elaborate death traps where two blades slowly close in on a prisoner's neck, a small nuclear device exploding, plus a brief interlude with the High Council of the Emerald Planet, basically a bunch of wacky robot aliens all shapes and sizes. My only complaint with the film is that otherwise, we don't get to see any aliens, and all the bad guys are disappointing human! Thankfully this would change in the following instalments. Watch this space for more.

Atomic Rulers of the World is a badly done Japanese children's serial that makes the later entries in the Godzilla series look like big budget epics. The Galactic Council (made up of some of the fakest looking robots you've ever seen) is concerned that if Earth gets into a nuclear war, the radiation could poison the entire galaxy. (Isn't space full of radiation anyway?) To prevent this catastrophe, they send the ultra powerful "Starman" to save Earth.The film suffers from a number of flaws, not the least of which being the producers' decision to insert a group of annoying orphans into the plot. At various points, the orphans show up to either help or be rescued by Starman. The young woman who looks after them is particularly cloying.At times, the film is just laugh out loud funny. For instance-a foreign country is planning to take over the world. Who do we call? (Aside from Starman, of course!) Why, the Tokyo police! Who else? Add to this some truly awful special effects, sub par for even B-level Japanese cinema, and you have the makings of a dubbed Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Honestly I enjoyed this movie. It was great fun to watch, but I still have the common sense that it's a piece of crap. This original Japanese superhero made exclusively for this film, is the most ridiculous idea ever. The movie takes place in 1964 japan with an alien race attempting to rule the planet earth. A nearby alien race, notices the nuclear yes nuclear threat from the other alien species. So they send their mightiest warrior of peace... Starman! to save the human race. They hand him some device that permits him to fly and understand human languages and stuff like that. The name is lame, so are his powers and special effects of the movie, but that's what makes it so great. Still the acting is terrible and the dubbing does'nt help. I received the film in a 50 movie pack so I really had no other way to watch the film. I doubt it would have been much better. There are a lot of fighting sequences all poorly done. The film has an anti-nuclear feel which keeps it from feeling really out-dated. The film's hero reminds me of Gamera just without the saber teeth, fire breath, hunger for fire, and rocket propulsion flight out of his shell. I guess it's the whole fact that he's a friend of all children. Which I guess makes it more of a kids film now-a-days but it was placed in a film pack with a label that says, For Mature Audiences. If your looking for a movie to laugh at this one is preferably your best bet. 2/10

Ken Utsui stars in his fourth and final outing as Starman, Japan's favorite fruity spandex clad superhero. This time he's out to stop the evil country of Magolia (no not Mongolia) from getting their hands on atomic weapons deadly enough to destroy the entire world. Unlike it's predecessors which featured lots of funny fighting and goofy effects, this flick plays like a third rate version of the George Reeves' Superman show (Starman's alter ego even dresses up like a mild mannered Oriental in a suit and fedora) and it's pretty dull to boot. There's also a lot of rigmarole with a bunch of snotty Japanese Little Rascals types that slow things down considerably as well. And instead of the goofy aliens in Evil Brain from Outer Space, all the villains in this one are a bunch of cheap thugs who are straight out of the forties. (And why is it that all those hired thugs are always dressed so impeccably in their dapper suits?) Anyway, die hard Starman fans (no not you Jeff Bridges enthusiasts out there) will want to check it out, but this one didn't nearly have enough goofy fight scenes for my liking. Oh yeah, and despite the title, there isn't a radioactive yardstick to be seen in this flick.