Destroy All Monsters
This film is considered the end of Toho's Golden Age of monster films and was intended to be the final Godzilla entry. However, it was successful enough that it was decided to continue the series, albeit as part of a film campaign called the Toho Champion Festival, a seasonal matinee specifically targeting children. This meant subsequent films would reduced budgets and staff since Godzilla movies were just too expensive to continue making in their original manner. For example this film, and the ones prior, had two or more large groups of crew members that divide the work on the character drama and special effects sequences. Case in point, cinematographer shot the live-action character drama directed by while different cinematographers, and Motoyoshi Tomioka, shot the monster sequences directed by . Subsequent films would reduced this to a singular crew that had to manage those aspects.,When the reporter announces that Baragon is attacking Paris, it is actually Gorosaurus. The Baragon suit was loaned out to Tsubaraya Productions for use on one of their television series and wasn't returned in time for filming.,News Reader: The major cities of the world are being destroyed, one-by-one by the monsters: Moscow by Rodan, Peking by Mothra, London by Manda, Paris by Baragon. And, here's a special news bulletin. Godzilla is now in New York City. The city is being invaded by Godzilla!,In Toho's international version, their English language credits list special effects director Sadamasa Arikawa as "Sanemasa Arikawa.",A Toho Video documentary released in the 1980s contained several unused and deleted takes from this film. The majority of this footage consists of alternate takes of finished scenes, such as the raids on Moscow and Paris by Rodan and Gorosaurus (respectively). Toho also filmed much more footage of the UN's defense of Tokyo, including a number of shots of missile launchers being deployed from the roofs of skyscrapers. The most notable unused shot in this feature has Godzilla thrashing the monster Manda against several Tokyo buildings. According to Haruo Nakajima, this was an impromptu act at the end of a take. This was likely removed from the finished film as both monsters were under Kilaak control and shouldn't have been fighting.,Edited into Godzilla vs. Gigan (1972),While "Destroy All Monsters" is no doubt a great Godzilla film, it definitely has its problems and it not the non-stop awesome epic it has acquired as a reputation over the years.

I think the film's rep as the "ultimate Godzilla epic" had to do with a few certain things. As kids, we certainly remember this movie being played on Saturday afternoons of the late late show because it does have a cool title and well, plenty of monsters. Also helping was the fact that after VHS got really popular, while plenty of Godzilla films were released (mostly shoddy released from cheapo companies), DAM was not released, and therefore was highly sought-after on the bootleg market. I remember reading a magazine in the mid-80's where one guy claims he paid $150 for as bootleg copy, imagine that!

How disappointing the DVD release is. While it's nice to have the film on disc, in English and widescreen, it has no title screen, no chapters, no extras, no nothing.

The film itself, well it is really good and a lot of fun. Aliens want to cause trouble for Earth, and get the monsters off Monster Island to destroy all the planet's major cities. Unfortunately, you hardly see any actual destruction of these cities, because it's pretty much just a quick shot or two (like Godzilla destroying the UN building in NYC, and that's that). All the monsters then get together in Tokyo (they seem to travel around the world really quickly) to collectively pounce on that city (well, where else?). Some really good destruction scenes happen here, and it is here where some good scenes were cut from the film, especially the famous "Godzilla vs. Manda" (the snake) scene, which you can see on a Toho "deleted scenes and outtakes" video. It's a quick scene but extremely cool to see and have, having read and heard about the missing fight since I was a little kid.

Really disappointing is the actual final battle between Ghidrah and the monster group. Ghidrah hardly fires his lasers, and doesn't really seem to put up a great fight. But he still is probably the coolest looking monster Toho ever came up with, so he's a fan fave anyway.

Of course the lack of monsters throughout the movie is a downer, because you barely even see some of them. Varan actually comes back for a quick shot at the end of the movie when his rubber puppet just kind of rises from behind a mountain and then shoots up into the sky.

There is a lot of action though, a decent plot, good music, pretty Japanese girls, and a lot of cool camera shots. While DAM isn't quite the legend it is made to be, it probably is the last truly great Godzilla film of the original series.,