Rodan
	Japanese Release Date: 1956
	Japanese Title: Rodan
	Japanese Running Time: 82 minutes
	U.S. Release Date: 1957
	U.S. Title: Rodan: The Flying Monster
	U.S. Distributor: DCA
	U.S. Running Time: 72 minutes
	Monsters: Rodan, Meganuron
	My Rating:
My Comments
A very, very good movie and Toho’s first ever color picture. Rodan looked great in this film, too bad his looks went downhill after this film. Anyway, onto the synopsis…
Synopsis
The movie opens in the Japanese mining town of Kitamatsu. When the deepest shaft floods, trapping several miners, the mining company brings in Safety Inspector Shigeru. After determining that the flooded shaft is filled with water, Shigeru finds a mutilated corpse. A murderer is suspected, and suspicion falls on Goro, who happens to be the brother of Shigeru's fiancee, Kiyo. Soon it becomes obvious that no human was behind the death. The town comes under attack by huge caterpillar-looking things called Meganurons. The authorities immediately move a machine gun into the mine to take care of the monsters, but after a freak earthquake, Shigeru is separated from the rest of the group. Some time later Shigeru is found alive in the mine, but he has totally lost his memory. Meanwhile, a high speed UFO is terrorizing the Pacific Rim. The UFO travels too high and too fast for anyone to get a look at it, but it is destroying planes and ships all over the place. An experience with some hatching bird eggs restores Shigeru's memory and he relives his experience in the cave: he was present at the hatching of a giant pteranadon egg! Apparently we're supposed to believe that the trauma of witnessing Rodan's birth caused Shigeru's amnesia. Anyway, Shigeru's convenient memory loss allows Rodan to grow to full size and to start mysteriously terrorizing the Japanese islands. By the time anyone knows exactly what they're up against, Rodan is 50 meters tall with a 120 meter wingspan and there are now two of them! It is soon determined that the Rodans are hanging around Mount Aso. So the Japanese military decides to bomb the giant monsters with some light artillery. As one might expect, the two monsters fly out of the mountain, head to the city of Saseba, and attack it. One of the Rodan's takes out the majority of the city and it burns to the ground. Both Rodan's flee the city and return to Mount Aso, where they are bombarded my heavy artilery until Mount Aso erupts. The Rodan's manage to escape, but one gets caught in the fumes and goes down in the lava. The other Rodan, refusing to live without his mate, also dives into the lava and both kaiju apparently perish.
Other Features: Behind the Scenes

Cast & Crew
Rodan Haruo Nakajima	Director Ishiro Honda
Shigeru Kenji Sahara	Producer Tomoyuki Tanaka
Kyo Yumi Shirakawa	Screenplay Takeshi Kimura, Takeo Murata, & Ken Kuronuma
Professor Kashiwagi Akihiko Hirata	Special Effects Eiji Tsuburaya
Police Chief Nishimura Akio Kobori	Music Akira Ifukube
Dr. Tsunikowa Fuyuki Murakami	Assistant Director Jun Fukuda
Izeki Yoshibumi Tajima