Wow! Certainly one of the best of the Godzilla series (and my personal favorite). This movie introduces Godzilla's most popular villain, King Ghidorah! With Ghidorah threatening to destroy Earth, it requires the combined strength of Godzilla, Rodan, and Mothra to stop him. By the way, this is the first movie that Godzilla journeys into as "the good guy." While Godzilla and Rodan weren't too happy to meet each other, it was actually Mothra who urged the two monsters to cooperate to battle Ghidorah and help mankind. And, this movie has a whole lot- towering monsters, a Martian, a princess, detectives, doctors, reporters, and, of course, Mothra's tiny twin fairy priestesses, who once again did their little song and dance and chat in unison. Honda's solid directing, Sekizawa's terrific script, and Ifukube's fantastic music score permeated the movie's success. There may be a lot more "human" scenes than "monster" scenes but since the plot is so solid, it made each human scene interesting and inspiring. Would this actually happen to Mars (Venus in the Japanese version) one day as stated in the movie? Go figure...........

Grade A

This one has some of Earth's best and most patriotic monsters teaming up to defeat a new creation from the Japanese film makers. Ghidorah is a three headed Cerberus like creature who spits fire from each head. He already destroyed the planet Venus or Mars depending on which version you watch. A princess from a small Himalayan country has been possessed by the spirit of the now dead world and is trying to warn of Ghidorah's coming and his powers. There's a subplot in this involving an attempted kidnapping of the princess.

In the end it's Mothra and his two fairy companions who persuade Godzilla and Rodan to team up and the three of them face Ghidorah in a handicap match and combine their skills to defeat the really alien dude. You have to admire the way Rodan and Mothra worked together on this with Godzilla providing a finishing move with some foreign objects.

These films are so cheesy, but they're lots of fun.

Wow! That's all I can say after watching this thing. Everything you have ever hoped for in a GODZILLA film comes together and melds into one in this awesomely fun romp. There are about a hundred different plot strands and plenty of action to take your mind off the nonsensical dialogue. The special effects are fantastic in a cheesy way, there are spies and policeman and traitors and stuff running around shooting each other, there's a prophet of doom from Jupiter (!) who warns of impending death, and best of all there's not one, not two, not three but FOUR giant monsters battling it out for the fate of mankind! Yes, this film is childish, and yes, it insults the viewer's intelligence. But it's so expertly-crafted and so sweet that you can't help but love it. For me, this is the cream of the series, a lot better than the stuffy films of the '50s like GODZILLA RAIDS AGAIN which proved to be stultifyingly boring at times. It's also the first time I've ever seen any tension in a GODZILLA film. This comes when the prophet girl warns of doom and gloom and Ghidora is about to be born, the film actually becomes frightening for three fifths of a second before descending back into inanity.

Lots of cities are destroyed as per usual but thankfully the film doesn't focus on this mass destruction. Indeed we get some espionage-type heroics from a valiant policeman, and an old scientist who looks like a Japanese version of John Neville. Fans of musicals are well supplied when twin fairies break into beautiful songs when calling Mothra. There's lots of shooting and action to keep things moving briskly along. The monsters even get to have a chat! In all this feels like a mini-epic, and there are the four monsters to contend with. First up is Godzilla, here playing the baddie-turned-good guy, you could see the direction the guys were taking in turning him into a lovable children's hero. Then there's Rodan, the rubbish-looking and cheesy yet cool bird monster who blows down buildings with his wings. Watch out for the hilarious rock-tossing contest between the above two monsters, very noisy and amusing. Mothra turns up as the small, friendly little monster who tries to do good and ends up being Ghidora's whipping boy, getting continually tossed into the air, although surprisingly you do feel sorry for him. However it's the title monster, Ghidora, who really stands out, an awesome creation and the best looking of the lot. His lightning breath looks very good too. The excellent finale has all of the monsters fighting together before Ghidora is forced to fly away a broken man, I mean, a broken monster. As a fun "kiddie" Godzilla film this is one of the best.