REVIEW: YONGARY: MONSTER FROM THE DEEP
REVIEW: THE GIANT MONSTER YONGARY
REVIEW: KIM KI-DUK [ 1967 ] 80'
REVIEW: KUK DONG
CAST: OH YEONG-IL, NAM JEONG-IM
CAST: LEE SUN-JAE, MOON KANG
PERSONAL RATING:
CRITICAL RATING:
WTF-FILMOMETER: THE GENESIS OF THE KOREAN MONSTER MOVIE

WTFFILM first tackled this film while still in its infancy - three years and eleven months to the day of this writing (10/02/2007) it was posted to the then-sparse wtf-film.com. I've changed considerably over these four years, as has this site, and - given MGM's recent re-release of the film in its original aspect ratio on DVD - I thought I'd give YONGARY another try.

It's safe to say that some things never change . . . and that YONGARY: MONSTER OF THE DEEP is one of them.

The film begins with an agonizingly lengthy pan across a remarkably artificial starscape - slowly the moon, then the Earth, creep into the frame and the English credits for the film begin. I can only assume that the original Korean credits for the film were considerably longer than those provided by A.I.P. - not that it helps us any these days.

The credits dispensed with, the film hightails it to some kind of government space-base thing on Earth - the wedding of an astronaut and the daughter of some guy with no name who always seems to wear sunglasses is over and the happy couple is being driven haphazardly down the middle of the road. Through awkward inter-family discussion we learn that Suna is involved in an unsatisfying relationship with I-loo, that I-loo's father died of overwork, and that, in South Korea, dying of overwork means you're destined to be a famous scientist. I-loo rushes off even though it was hoped he'd stay for lunch (apparently Koreans don't eat at weddings) and happens upon a strange sight . . .

Not far down the road the newlyweds have stopped and gotten out of their car - both are scratching themselves all over. At first concerned, I-loo soon realizes what's going on. He sends the newlyweds on their way and out of the bushes comes I-cho, the sadistic child star we'll be following for the duration of the film. It seems I-cho took a top-secret itch ray from I-loo's laboratory - after a bit of scolding, I-loo agrees with I-cho that causing newlyweds to break out in spontaneous hives is hysterical.

At an undisclosed hotel the astronaut-husband is fast asleep on the balcony in front of what I can only assume is supposed to be the night sky - the Universe should watch itself if this is the case, as it looks like it has a black lung floating about the middle of itself. His new wife wakes him up to beg for sex in a family-friendly 1960's fashion - he responds by immediately belittling her. The two start making out in the end but are interrupted by a call from the girls father - this comes through on a walky talky with a ginormous antenna and a big flashy red light (the original cellular phone).

It seems that the young woman married the one-and-only capable astronaut in South Korea - sadly, he has to be torn away from his honeymoon to spy on a nuclear test "somewhere in the Middle East." The astronaut takes off in a multi-stage rocket (poorly staged model work, but still one of the more scientifically accurate depictions to be seen in 60's Asian science fiction) and travels a hell of a ways away from the Earth in order to watch the test. . .

Which happens pretty much immediately.

After the test is completed and the mushroom cloud clears, a mysterious earthquake begins - at this time radio contact is also lost with the astronaut. Suddenly I-cho and I-loo are in the control center of the space-base and, after five or so minutes of simulated suspense, radio contact is regained and the astronaut lands safely. In the meanwhile, scientists on the ground have determined that the strange earthquake has a moving epicenter and, even worse, that it seems to be headed directly for Seoul. A base of operations from which to track the earthquake as it moves is setup and much silly banter begins.

The usual heated debate between noble scientist and hot-headed military commander commences without much of anything being accomplished - in short order the general has brought up an obscure Korean legend about a monster that's supposed to be connected with earthquakes. I'll give you three guesses as to what the legendary monster's name is . . . The earthquake heads closer, and closer, and the scientist guy in charge of the whole thing who's daughter is married to the astronaut gives the hot-headed military commander the order to put the country under martial law.

Meanwhile, I-loo is doing some kind of science stuff that no one bothers to explain.

On the border between North and South Korea - just northwest of Seoul - the earthquake has struck. A photographer snaps several pictures of the back of some strange creature poking out of a fissure and rushes off in a jeep. For reasons unknown this jeep is randomly thrown from the road and down a steep hillside, catching fire and exploding along the way. Found by a couple of guards, the photographer is dragged into the earthquake monitoring headquarters (why not a hospital!?) where he drops the camera onto a table, mumbles a little, and dies.

The scientists and military guys project the film on a big screen and, upon seeing two blurry pictures of a bumpy thing surrounded by smoke, they promptly announce that the reason for the earthquake really is the monster Yongary. The public is alerted and the evacuation of Seoul begins. People panic and run while religio-nuts preach doomsday to the fleeing masses - meanwhile, rich people greedily eat and college kids pour beer on other college kids while they pray.

In the meanwhile, Yongary discovers that walking is easier than digging and emerges from the side of a mountain. A tank battalion is quickly ordered into the area and just as quickly destroyed by the monster's fiery breath and stomping feet. The military effectively dispensed with, Yongary wanders his way into Seoul - there he causes untold destruction to various sub par plaster and cardboard model work. A number of scenes here recall other monster films - the wonky angles on shots of people fleeing recalls the previous year's GAMERA VS. BARUGON while Yongary wading through a building uncomfortably like the Diet in Tokyo recalls an almost identical scene from the original GOJIRA [1954].

I-loo and I-cho run around to get a look at the monster and Suna runs after them - I-loo is injured by a piece of horizontally flying debris while protecting Suna and I-cho inexplicably disappears. As it turns out, I-cho is following Yongary by running around the sewers of Seoul. The giant monster makes his way out of town and into an oil refinery, where the child witnesses him devouring a container of crude oil. Trying to keep him from causing more untold destruction (at least I think that's what he's trying to accomplish), I- cho turns off the pumps to the oil storage containers and sends Yongary into the kaiju equivalent of the DT's.

Then he witnesses something fascinating - Yongary's tale smashes into a storage house for ammonia precipitate and gets it all over himself. This sends the monster into even more fits. I-cho reports his findings to I-loo. With the military's plans for the monster failing left and right, can I-loo find the right chemical with which to dispense with Yongary for good?

The answer to that question is yes, of course, and is just one of the reasons that this film is as unlovable as it is. The conclusion is all too well known - I-loo sprinkles his special ammonia precipitate formula on Yongary, who promptly falls over into a river twitching and bleeding from his orifices. Obviously targeted at children more so than adults, the presence of this graphic depiction of the death of Yongary is nothing short of revolting. Inept as it is, Yongary could have survived the test of time as an amusingly trivial bit of juvenile science fiction were it not for that single scene.

That's not to say that Yongary is without it's other faults.

To begin with, the film is frustratingly slow going from start to finish - even the monster sequences have a lack of forward motion and drive that's difficult to explain. Characters are little more than crude one-dimensional renderings of human beings - the scientist-statesman, the general, the love interest, and the strapping young researcher - and precious little of interest goes on between them. To make matters worse, most of the characters in the film go entirely unnamed in the A.I.P. dubbing of the film, making it difficult to keep track of who everyone is and what, if anything, they're doing. Rumors have been and are still circulating that the film originally ran a full 100 minutes - while recent research shows that the 80 minute A.I.P. cut is, in fact, full length, one has to wonder what people could possibly think might have been removed given the agonizingly ill-paced footage already present.

And then there's the music. Constantly present and never terribly engaging, the soundtrack by prolific composer Jeon Jeong-guen is one of the worst I've ever encountered in a science fiction film (though the score for THE X FROM OUTER SPACE [1969] runs a close second). Editing is fairly poor throughout - some scenes go on for entirely too long and others are randomly hashed in with the rest for no apparent reason (a long pan across Seoul at night is sandwiched inexplicably between two military conferences, shots of people looking at things and working lead nowhere, etc.). Direction is hard to gauge given that this film is not available in its original language, but seems to have been predominantly of the point-and-shoot variety.

Then there are the special effects.

Matte work for the film is on par with any other kaiju epic you've ever seen and I have no real complaints about it. Other aspects have not fared so well. First up is the hideous blue-screened segment showing Yongary's bottom half (considerably smaller than it should be as well) interacting with pre-shot footage of a jeep losing control. That jeep is subsequently cut in half by the monster's nose-horn laser, leading to the infamous tiny third wheel that's easily seen under the front half of the jeep.

YONGARY is also at a tie with REPTILICUS [1961] in terms of having some of the worst miniature effects work WTFFILM has ever seen. Many buildings are nothing but hollow collapsible facades with no discernible insides while others seem to literally be cardboard boxes made up to look like buildings. The collapsible structures are built in such a way that they break apart in a completely unrealistic manner - those who wish to poke fun at the effects of Toho films from the period should see this film to get an educational course on just what bad miniature effects work really is.

Other embarrassing giveaways appear throughout the film. Yongary himself is seen with a metal nozzle in his mouth from which flames shoot out and the jets and helicopters that buzz about him often have very visible wires. In a particularly absurd effects work blunder, in-cockpit views of pilots in jets are filmed in front of completely stationary backdrops and, no matter how much CO2 is pumped in front of the camera, the illusion of motion is lost. Then, of course, there are the blue-screened people seen fleeing Yongary as he wanders by some buildings on the horizon - the effect itself is not entirely ill-achieved but is given away by the fact that the inserted people look to be roughly 20 feet tall when the scale of the buildings surrounding them is taken into consideration.

YONGARY was a big production for South Korea in its day - costing something in the order of $50,000 to make - and the Kuk Dong production company brought in a Japanese special effects team to assist in the project. Yongary himself was built by Masao Yagi - quite possibly the same Masao Yagi who created the fantastic score for WTFFILM's favorite Japanese monster romp ever, LEGEND OF DINOSAURS AND MONSTER BIRDS [1977] - and Akira Suzuki, the same pair of men who had previously created the Gamera suit for GIANT MONSTER GAMERA [1965]. The hired help apparently had quite an influence on the production, as WTFFILM noticed a few telling similarities between the early Gamera films and Yongary - buildings internally lit with fluorescent lights (you can see them flickering due to the high frame rate the special effects sequences were film at), camera angles and compositions that recall GAMERA VS. BARUGON [1966], and the fact that Yongary's roar sounds not unlike Barugon's at times (pay attention to it at the end of the film, in particular).

One could berate YONGARY for hours - and I'm sure that many have and many more will. WTFFILM chooses to stop here, before it spends more time on the title than it can rightfully forgive. MGM's DVD of the title is bare bones but presents the film in a pretty much perfect 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer - with brilliant colors and crystal clear resolution, it's possible that the film looks less impressive than ever on this disc. With pan-and-scan copies it was at least possible to hope that a full resolution copy would reveal the film to be something special - sadly, this isn't the case.

YONGARY remains as disappointing as ever a full 40 years after its original theatrical release and will, no doubt, remain just as disappointing for 40 years more. Potential for fun viewing among friends is here, but there's certainly better fodder out there. In the end YONGARY is just a ponderously slow monster film with an unsettling conclusion that may well be more famous than the film itself.

WTFFILM can't recommend.