What an incredible vintage book!
This book published in 1983 is in FANTASTIC condition. The world of Toho SPFX movies is brought to life in this vintage 1983 soft cover book There are 50 pages of high quality glossy photos of the major Science Fiction movies made by Toho from 1954-1980.
The movies included are: All Godzilla movies from 54-75, Rodan, Mothra, Frankenstein Conquers the World, Yog, King Kong Escapes, War of the Gargantuas, Matango, Latitude Zero, The Human Vapor, Battle in Outer Space, Atragon, The Mysterians, Gorath, The Last War, Japan Submersion and War in Space.
This is a must have for all fans of Japanese Science Fiction Movies. The book measures 8 by 12 inches.
THIS IS A FANTASTIC BOOK by a master of special effects who has passed on. We are sad that that the world has lost a creative filmaker and businessman and a true gentleman Kawakita-san.
We obtained the advance copies of this book by attending the Heisei Godzilla Movie Festival running in November 2009 in Tokyo. On each Saturday of the month not only was a movie shown but there was a pre-screening a talk with some of the people involved in the movie production.
The book was officially released on November 30th 2009. Kawakita, Koichi is the editor/author of the book and the most recent special effects master of Toho Films. The title is Heisei Godzilla Chronicle; 55 years a star; 20th annniversary. It covers what are known as the Heisei period Godzilla Movies: Godzilla vs Biollante, Godzilla vs King Ghidora, Godzilla vs Mothra, Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla, Godzilla vs Space Godzilla and Godzilla vs Destroyer. Each movie is given a separate section which is broken down by the weekly production schedule. There are many behind the scenes and action shots! The photos are from Kawakita's personal collection. Each movie has extensive artist's concept sketches of all the monsters and vehicles. There is the full story board from Godzilla vs Biollante. There are biographies and photos of all the production staff including directors, cinematographers, suit makers, prop makers, model makers-everyone who was involved in the special effects or behind the camera production.
There is so much in this book we can't cover it all.The book has 271 pages; soft back book dimensions 8 1/2 by 12 inches.
The Castro Theatre in San Francisco was the place to be November 17-23, 2004, in honor of Godzilla's 50th birthday The best Godzilla Film Fest we have known about took place there. This is the 16 page program book from the event sponsored by Bay Area Film Events which showed 20 Godzilla or Kaiju Films.
The special guests were great:Russ Tamblyn (the first ever appearance in regard to War of the Gargantuas), Hiroshi Koizumi who was in Godzilla Raids Again, and many other Godzilla movies (he reprised his role in Mothra 1961 42 years later in Tokyo Sos), Tsutomu Kitagawa (the latest actor to don the Godzilla suit), Jerry Ito best remembered for his role of the vile Clark Nelson in Mothra 1961), Akira Kubo played many roles in Toho Films including Matago, Gorath, Son of Godzilla, Destroy All Monsters.
There are biographies of all the guests in the program. Also every film shown is given several paragraphs of synopsis and commentary by August Ragone of Henshin! Online. The center page has photos from some of the Godzilla Movies. The cover illustration is Mark Nagata.
