Distruggete DC 59 - Da Base Spaziale a Hong Kong

(Kyuketsuki Gokemidoro)

1968, regia di Hajime Sato

Scheda: Nazione: Giappone - Produzione: Shochiku Films Ltd. - Distribuzione: Regionale, BijouFlix Releasing, Pacemaker Pictures Inc. & Teitel Film, Prima Film, Shochiku Films, Sinister Cinema - Soggetto: Kyuzo Kobayashi, Susumu Takahisa - Sceneggiatura: Kyuzo Kobayashi, Susumu Takahisa - Fotografia: Shizuo Hirase - Montaggio: Akimitsu Terada - Scenografia: Shinei Bijutsu Kogei - Musiche: Shunsuke Kikuchi - Formato: Fujicolor - Durata: 84'.

Cast: Teruo Yoshida, Tomomi Sato, Eizo Kitamura, Hideo Ko, Kathy Horan, Yûko Kusunoki, Kazuo Kato, Hiroyuki Nishimoto, Harold Conway, Andrew Hughes, Masaya Takahashi.

Trama e commenti: cinematografo.it - film.spettacolo.virgilio.it - fantafilm.it - fantaclassici.com - mymovies.it: «Un aereo di linea giapponese è vittima di un dirottamento e, come se non bastasse (... e non basta, poiché siamo solo all'inizio del film ...) precipita dopo avere incrociato un UFO che ne ha improvvisamente bloccato i motori. Dai rottami dell'aereo il dirottatore tenta la fuga, ma le cose gli vanno male, poiché il disco volante lo cattura ed un alieno si impadronisce del suo corpo. Stessa sorte tocca ad un'altra sopravvissuta per mezzo della quale l'alieno, Gokemidoro, annuncia la tremenda missione della sua gente: distruggere la razza umana, colpevole di non avere imparato a vivere in pace. Da questo momento il gruppetto dei sopravvissuti ingaggia una inutile lotta contro l'impalpabile nemico ... uno dopo l'altro, quasi tutti verranno da quello "posseduti". Un pilota e la bionda hostess riescono tuttavia ad allontanarsi e raggiungono un'autostrada che (per caso) si trova nelle vicinanze. I due sono ansiosi di dare l'allarme, ma qualcosa fa capire loro che ormai è troppo tardi ... Gli automobilisti che essi incrociano sono corpi senza vita, ed il cielo che essi guardano è tutto solcato da trionfanti dischi volanti. Il gruppo dei sopravvissuti del volo DC 59 riunisce un politicante corrotto, un paio di assassini, uno psichiatra, un paio di bellezze femminili (una contesa dagli stessi uomini), un pilota ed una hostess ... un assortimento così stravagante di "buoni", "cattivi" e "così-così" - tipico di tanti western con il gruppo in pericolo - che compendia (probabilmente) nelle intenzioni dello sceneggiatore la varietà umana. La scelta riflette una visione un po' pessimistica, ma certo è funzionale allo sviluppo di una vicenda molto intricata che conta assai sugli "effettacci" (corpi mummificati, squarci sulla fronte, fosforescenze di varie tonalità, presenza aliena vampirescamente succhiatrice della vita umana) e che, per forza, non può non richiamare alla memoria L'invasione degli ultracorpi».

Plot Summary, Synopsis, Review: IMDb - entertainment.msn.com - tvguide.com - vampyres-online.com - terra.es - cinefania.com - fosteronfilm.com: «A UFO causes a plane to crash in the mountains. The survivors (the abrupt co-pilot, a weak-willed stewardess, a corrupt politician, a ruthless arms dealer, his drunken wife, a young anarchist, an American war widow, an obsessed space scientist, an amoral psychologist, and an assassin) fall upon each other instead of working together. Things get worse when the assassin is possessed by an alien, and turned into a vampire. Stylish for its low budget, this horror import plays out like an extended version of the Twilight Zone classic, The Monster’s are Due on Maple Street, crossed with Night of the Living Dead. The people are dim-witted and vicious, and are more than happy to destroy themselves. Alien invaders don’t have to do much with this bunch to turn them into savage killers. I suspect the viewer was supposed to like the stewardess (such helpless but cute females were often ideals in American films of the era, and I have no reason to believe the same wasn’t true in Japan), as well as the inconsiderate co-pilot (if so, this one is more of a cultural thing as I found him irritating). The rest are the scum of the Earth. The space scientist is willing to sacrifice another human just to see what a “vampire” is really like, and he’s the best of them. The arms dealer is bribing the politician, and throwing in his wife’s body as incentive. The politician is not only accepting the money, but molests the wife in front of everyone. Both are capable of murder. The psychologist enjoys frightening people so he can watch them react, and the anarchist is ready to set off a bomb because he’s bored. They are all stuck on the downed plane, afraid to venture out. It doesn’t take long for the thin veneer of civilization to vanish. I was rooting for the extraterrestrials. The human drama pulled me in, and the anti-war theme is effectively presented (if they weren’t fighting each other, then maybe they could stop the aliens), though it gets a bit thick at times, with inserts of red-tinted stills of the Vietnam War popping up several times. Some of the scenes will stay with you long after the film is over: the red skies and suicidal birds, the vaginal head wound that the alien uses to enter and leave the assassin, and the ending (which I won’t give away). These are great moments in horror/science fiction.

Obviously, it’s not all of so high a level (or I’d have given it more s). The American, on her way to pick up her husbands body, speaks English, so it is easier for me to evaluate the actress’s performance, and it is terrible. Close-your-eyes-and-play-jackhammer-sounds-through-headphones-just-to-miss-it kind of terrible. Perhaps she gave up trying when she read her lines. I suspect the writers were not at home with English. The dub on a ’70s Godzilla flick has better dialog. The special effects vary from acceptable to laughable; the most noticeable example of the latter is the foam boulders that keep falling from a cliff. And what’s with that cliff? Whenever an avalanche would be handy, down comes the Styrofoam. Not that there is any place for those artificial blocks to be coming from, except the hands of grips who are off camera, tossing them over the side. An obvious dummy is also thrown over the edge ins a similar fashion, and it looks every bit as realistic. The plot comes in ridiculous exposition moments when everything stops so someone can tell the audience what it all means. In one case, a survivor is possessed so the aliens can use her body (though not her voice?) to explain who they are and why they’ve come. But once you get the answers to those, it becomes clear that there was no reason for the aliens to say a word. The space scientist also relates a cringe-inducing theory held by many “scientists”: Earth is bound to be taken over by aliens because they will be drawn here due to the dropping of the A-bombs over Japan. Huh. That’s quite a theory. Goke – Bodysnatcher from Hell has gotten some press recently because Quentin Tarantino mentioned it as an influence; he copied the shot of the plane against the red sky Kill Bill Vol 1».

Approfondimenti: Movie Review

Conosciuto anche con i titoli: Ufo, distruggete base Luna; Body Snatcher from Hell; Goke Vampiraus dem Veltall; Goke the Vampire; Goke, Body Snatcher from Hell; Vampire Gokemidoro; Cuerpos Diabolicos.

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