GAMERA 2: ATTACK OF LEGION (1996)
Hold on, wasn't it called Advent of Legion? Assault of 'The Legion'? Or was it Invasion? It's been a while since this 1990s monster trilogy was mentioned here, so the details are sketchy and the release titles are varied. In fact it must have been nearly a decade ago in blogging time. Ten years of writing utter rubbish that nobody reads as a substitute for any semblance of mental wellbeing, where does the time go? In those days the old DVDs you could get in the mail were a source of all kinds of world cinema gems, but that was before the dark times, before the age of streaming. Now thankfully there are new Blu-ray sets, so let's take a look to see if this is still the best part of the series.
This second chapter is still a great tokusatsu romp despite some... peculiar caveats. After a strange NASA voice over prologue the story begins at the Sapporo Science Centre. For the viewer it's a visual treat as the snowy Hokkaido locations make this stand apart from the other films in the series. For the marketing team it's a way of getting in a lot of beer product placement. Billboards in this sort of feature (real or miniature) are nothing new, and plenty of Kirin advertisements are on display. But the writers also were on board as the alien swarm 'Legion' attacks a factory full of lager bottles. It's for the silicon content of the glass and not the booze, honest.
In the bottling plant we find that former cop Osako (Yukijirô Hotaru) has lost his job after the events of the first film, but he gets little to do here. Elsewhere psychic teenager Asagi (Ayako Fujitani) is also reduced mainly to a cameo in a skiing holiday subplot. Meanwhile violent occurrences onboard a subway train suggest that the alien visitors are growing in size and it's up to a bunch of B-movie archetypes to put the pieces together and formulate a plan. Scientist Midori (Miki Mizuno) and military leader Colonel Watarase (Toshiyuki Nagashima) soon find themselves involved in an alien autopsy.
What makes the story distinct beyond these clichés is the style of the film itself. There are political news broadcasts, Defence Force scenes, freeze frames, and stock footage, all in an attempt to make this feel more gritty than it needs to be. Which is all pretty successful in terms of building up the overall tone and aesthetic, even if it veers away from the mystical ancient world elements in the rest of the trilogy. There are strange lights in the sky, underground communication problems, and huge alien seed pods. ESP and mystic amulets are put aside, at least fort the main bulk of the running time.
Beyond these standard sci-fi inclusions another major strength of the movie is the sense of scale. Sure they say the Symbiotic Legion's Queen is building a nest that will destroy Earth when it launches its offspring into space. But showing a high level of detail is what sells it all. There might be some CGI depicting all the tiny alien drones but elsewhere things are pretty tactile. Ground level scenes showing destruction sell the mixture of model locations and real people, as do interior shots and things like bicycles and phone boxes shaking as the monsters do battle. Tanks rattling by and shots from the perspective of jeeps and helicopters also lend it all a sense of reality.
The more outlandish elements such as Gamera's newly developed fireball attack are used for a climax that makes it feel big. Some of these moments such as Legion unleashing a bizarre alien laser whip could have been handled poorly, but the animated effects are pretty spectacular. Some of the music starts to sound like Total Recall at times but the most overtly fantastical moments are still part of a story about human co-operation. They even manage to include the old Showa trope of 'Gamera falls into a coma' along the way. Apparently in that earlier review so long ago this was all more contrived and even tedious in parts. However, with a fresh eyes, a high definition release, and the passage of time this is certainly the best of the three.
4/5
BONUS REVIEW
GAMERA 3: REVENGE OF IRIS (1999)
Or is it Gamera 3: The Absolute Guardian... The Incomplete Struggle or just Gamera 1999? The confusing naming trend continues in this final episode, as does the product placement. This time... Pizza Hut. However, the writers do return to the mystical realm of the first movie as an undersea lab finds the spooky mass grave of Gamera's ancestors. The magic beads are also back in a tale of ancient daggers and mystic caves. Unfortunately this also means a lot more dodgy CGI effects but by now things were changing in a new era when distribution was handled by Daiei's former rival studio Toho.
The strength this time around is the depiction of Gamera as a threat in what is often a straight forward disaster movie. Children still claim the monster is their friend and characters say they 'trust' the giant turtle, but there's now a cruel sense of irony. Unfortunately, despite incredible amounts of collateral damage, this idea of an unreliable narrator isn't really focused on. Instead it branches into two other genres; a horror film in which a bullied girl becomes attached to a flesh draining creature, and a live-action anime where characters give rambling self-serious speeches about the mana of the planet.
After a lot of people are killed by the deadly monster 'Iris' and a kidnapping plot plays out all parties converge at a train station to watch another city be destroyed; this time Kyoto. It's interesting to suggest that Gamera was always a destructive force and the twisted flashbacks showing the first film in a new light are compelling. But this is at odds with the overall narrative and all the attempts to show the big guy as an underdog. Iris and Gyaos are human eating genetic freaks that need to be wiped out to save the world, it's not really ambiguous at all.
Many fans cite this as the best entry in the franchise but it's just got too much going on as people explain things via Dreamcast games, before being crushed to death like bumbling idiots. If they'd cut out these oddball characters that seem to have fallen out of another series it might have had time for a stronger ending. Instead it finishes with a kind-of climax but sort-of cliffhanger that was never resolved. Some of the editing effects are very flashy and plenty of the apocalyptic suitmation set pieces are Earth shattering. But elsewhere the weak computer generated moments take over and become too distracting. It's enjoyable but ultimately uneven, which is a shame.
3/5
