Author: MA/Anitama Cover Source: Eiji Marutani
In 1969, Toho released three feature films, the first of which was "Latitude 0 Battle" (緯度0大作戦), which was the last work produced by Honta Inoshiro, Eiji Marutani, and Yuki Takumi. The stunt art production of the submarine "α" designed by Taiyuki Inoue and the submarine "Black Fish" designed by his assistant Mutsuru Toshima became a mechanical design work of a master-apprentice duel in this film. Then the second film was released, "The Battle of the Sea of Japan", the story included the Russo-Japanese War Battle of Incheon Chong Naval Battle, the Lushun Port Blockade Operation, the Yellow Sea Naval Battle, the 203 Highland Battle, etc., in the film appeared in many historical famous warships, Such as Mikasa, Shikishima, Fuji, Asahi, Hatsukase, Yashima, Suvorov Duke, Oslijavia, Alexander III, Borodino, Eagle, etc., the story and scene production can be called the level of super large-scale feature films at that time. The film was also the last film completed by Eiji Marutani as a stunt director, leaving a historic mark. The third part is "Crazy Explosion" (クレージーの大爆発), which uses separate subtitles in the opening subtitles, followed by the subtitles of "Director Akiyoshi Nakano" in a similar style to the daiei movie.
Poster for Latitude 0 Battle.
In 1970, a major historic turning point occurred in the photographic community. During the filming of the mitsubishi Mirai Pavilion at the 1969 Osaka World Expo, Eiji Marutani was admitted to the hospital for a sudden serious illness, and then transferred to a villa in Ito City in December, until January 1970, when his condition deteriorated and he suffered a heart attack, leaving this world forever. At the time of Marutani's death, he also left behind two unfinished projects, "Hui Ye Ji" (かぐや姫) and "Japan Airplane Boy" (ニッポンヒコーキ野郎). Round Valley unremittingly wanted to make more movies to complete his dreams, but at the end of his career, he abruptly stopped and bid farewell to the world in regret.
Photo of Eiji Marutani.
The death of Eiji Marutani has deprived the film industry of a mainstay, and also symbolizes the end of an era of Japanese monster close-up movies. In the entertainment-oriented environment of the Japanese film market in the Showa 30s, the industry rule of "block booking" (ブロックブッキング) prevailed. The so-called "block booking" is that a movie theater only broadcasts the film works of a certain film company, and the film company regularly provides film works to the theater throughout the year to ensure the screening cycle. In other words, film companies must produce a large number of film works one after another to meet the needs of theater broadcasting. In this context, as a member of the production team, Round Valley was forced to shoot a large number of film works every year to meet the needs of the company, took on a considerable number of film production tasks, and the atmosphere of the entire film industry also made most of the pressure accumulate on the film production staff. Round Valley's death in 1970 coincided with the sunset era when the Japanese film industry was in decline collectively, so his death also became a tombstone to the decline of the industry at that time. On March 1, 1970, Toho Films, facing the decline of Japanese cinema, finally abolished the special technology division. In 1971, Toho split the production department into two separate companies, Toho Film Co., Ltd. and Toho Image Co., Ltd. Since then, the original Toho films have ceased to produce their own films, and have continued to exist in the form of a film rationing company.
Jessola Ganime Carmeba Showdown! The Great Monster of the South Sea poster
After the death of Eiji Marutani, Toho still insisted on releasing 2 feature films in 1970, Jessola Ganime Carmeba Showdown! The Great Monster of the South Sea (ゲゾラ・ガニメ・カメーバ決戦 南海の大獣) and The Thrilling Showa History: Warlords (の昭和史軍閥). As the release of the Toho Champion Festival, "The Great Monster of the South Sea" is not filmed with the old monster characters, but uses three new monster characters. Although the film's promotional posters say the words "Eiji Marutani" and "Sadama Arikawa", the special effects director Arikawa is actually responsible for the close-up of the film, and only Arikawa Sadamasa is responsible for the "special technology" position in the subtitles of the film. "Warlord" is a hastily completed close-up film, almost edited from the live-action clips of past movies, which perfectly cuts the existing film clips from the past and the newly filmed character scenes to form a new movie. For example, the clip of battleship Nagato is from the old clip of "Yamamoto Fifty-Six", the clip of the special attack team attack is from the scene clip of "Pacific Wings" and so on. The scene of the Battle of Midway combines the battle scenes about Midway in "Pacific Arashi" and "Yamamoto Fifty-Six", and deliberately features aircraft carriers such as Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Wyvern, and the completion of this film is more the result of the hard work of the editors.
In 1970, studios other than Toho continued to introduce close-up films to maintain the small audience market, such as Daiei's Gamera vs. The Great Warcraft Garca (ガメラ対大魔獣ジャイガー) and the TV special-up "Ot Fight" (ウルトラファイト). "Otter Fighting" is really just a 5-minute TV short collection, and there are two types of short films. One is the use of monster clips from Ultraman and Ultraman, and the other is a new shot of Otsevin vs. Monsters or Monsters fighting each other, similar to wrestling matches, accompanied by narration narration. The Toho Champion Festival and "Otter Fighting" have made the audience positioning of monster close-ups more youthful, which has made the audience group of monster close-ups established as children, and also laid the audience foundation for the rise of monster close-ups in the future.
Poster of Gamera vs. Monster Gaka.
In 1971, Arikawa Sadamasa, who had served as Toho's stunt director, left Toho and jumped to the International Screening Company, and after Arikawa's resignation, Nakano Akiyoshi took on the responsibility of Toho's special director. Director Nakano's subsequent credits include: Thrilling Showa History: The Battle of Okinawa (の昭和史 沖沖戦決戦), Godzilla vs. Heidora (ゴジラ対ヘドラ), Earth Attack Order Godzilla vs. Gaigang (Earth Attack ゴジラ対ガイガン),Godzilla vs. Megalo(ゴジラ対メガロ),《人革》(人間革)。 In 1971, in the face of the sluggish domestic film market, Nikho stopped the production of ordinary films and instead specialized in the adult film market, and Daiei Corporation also closed down in the same year. Daiei Co., Ltd.'s last Gamera film was the July 17, 1971 film Gamera vs. Gigula the Deep-Headed Monster (ガメラ対 Deep-Sea Monster獣ジグラ), when Daiei's Gamera series production team was planning the next game "Gamera vs. Two-Headed Monster W" (ガメラ対双頭魔獣 W), but it was eventually turned into a dead talk due to the collapse of Daiei.
Stills from "The Return of Ultraman".
1971 became a tragic year for the end of the Gamera series, however, the end of the old era also symbolized the brewing and beginning of a new era. In the same year, three emerging television feature films appeared, namely Cosmic Ape Man Gori (Cosmic Ape Man Gori) produced by P Production on January 2, Ultraman Returned from Marutani Production(帰ってきたウルトラマン), which began airing on April 2, and Kamen Rider (仮面ライダー), which began airing on April 3. Among them, "Cosmic Ape Man Goli" was renamed "Cosmic Ape Man Goli to Electron Splitter" in the middle of the broadcast (Cosmic Ape Man ゴリ対スペクトルマン), and later renamed "Electronic Spectral Man" (スペクトルマン). The emergence of these three works has brought new strength and vitality to the fading monster specials.
Illustration of the Cosmic Ape Man Goli.
One of the reasons why the first monster craze eventually faded was that the focus of children's audiences shifted more to sports comics and weird photography. However, with the emergence of newborn monster close-ups and more filming with children's audiences as the focus, the once lost child audiences have gradually returned to the screen of monster close-ups. With the emergence of "Cosmic Ape Man Goli", it has driven the ratings of children's audiences, making the film's ratings once surpass "Giant Star" and won the love of many child audiences. "Kamen Rider" began with the debut of Kamen Rider No. 2 and Kamen Hayato, and set off a wave of imitation of the transformation action among children, and young audiences began to imitate the action of the one-word transformation in the film to play Kamen Rider. Ultraman The Return is a work made by Round Valley that focuses more on monster wreaking havoc and monsters fighting Ultraman. This is in stark contrast to the positioning of the plot of "Otterseven". Joining the directing team of "The Return of Ultraman" are Toho's famous directors Honta Inoshiro and Matsubayashi Sonee. On the other hand, at that time, a group of production personnel within Marutani came out independently and established Nippon Hyundai Planning Company and KODAI Corporation, and the two companies later cooperated in the production of the TV special film "Silver Face Flying Man" (シルバー仮面ジャイアント).
Stills from Silver Mask.
Gradually ushering in the new dawn of special photography is the rise of TV hero close-ups, in contrast to monster close-ups are still facing the dilemma of not being able to open the situation, and the focus of the entire close-up industry has gradually shifted to the hero-themed TV close-up series. Due to the large number of hero close-ups and animations, the playback time between hero close-ups and animations began to overlap with each other, and at its most intense, there were three different types of programs playing each other in the same time period to compete for audience ratings. On the one hand, the monster returned to the audience's vision with the rise of the hero close-up, on the other hand, the future of the monster's close-up was still unknown in 1971.
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Original: m.anitama.cn/article/08417c0241b349c6?utm_source=toutiao