 |
 There's a series of disasters and a ten million year old Princess named Dragon
Mom shows up from the center of the Earth to enslave humanity. Professor Chang
gets a volunteer and transforms him into an "indestructible, nuclear-powered
bionic superhero, Infra-Man." 1975, 90 minutes, VHS
I'll admit it, I thought this thing was da bomb (and that shows how hip I am)
back in the mid seventies when I saw it at the movie theatre. Of course I was
still crapping my drawers and taking afternoon naps (ahh, some things never
change) after recess, but I was sure that this was about the greatest of all
rubber suited monster movies from the far east that was ever made. It was
with quite a bit of glee then that I spotted this on the internet for $2.99. I
was urging my cable modem to move even faster than usual so that I could
finalize my order before some young poser with a soul patch on his chin that
looked like the hair under my armpits snatched it up before I could lock it in.
I was jacked when I got the video and it came in this colorful box showing the
might of Infra-Man
. The old lady saw the video box and commented that it looked
like some kind of work out tape. After that comment I worked her right out of
my trailer so that I could relive all the fabulous moments I remembered from my
youth, like when Ultraman, I mean Infra-Man
, grew to gargantuan size and simply
stepped on one the monsters and pulped his ugly butt into green goo. I
strained to remember all the other good parts, but none came immediately to
mind, so I just assumed that my young brain was so overwhelmed by the revelatory
nature of the film that I couldn't fathom all the good parts (kind of like if
you ever got a look at God or something). I was also buoyed by the oft-cited
event that Siskel and Ebert gave this two thumbs up (Didn't one of them die of
a
brain tumor or something?) and a lot geeks with bogus web sites cream themselves
over it (Get outside once in awhile and enjoy real life - after all this is the
only movie review site worth checking out!) so I was sure I was in for some good
old fashioned Hong Kong kung-fu monster fun.  The cringing began right away as the ultra-amateurish titles came up (blatantly
tacked on by some cruddy American film distributor, no doubt). They showed a
little footage of each of the monsters that would be in the show along with
their astoundingly banal names like the Emperor of Doom, the Giant Beetle
Monster, and the Rubber Suit Kid. I was still holding out some hope, since any
movie with a villainess that was a scantily clad Asian woman with a whip and
named Dragon Mom certainly couldn't be all bad. Or could it? Things begin
with these people in a VW bus or something cruising down the road when suddenly
this monster crashes into the road in front of them. The road caves in,
everyone but the old timer driving escapes the bus and the bus (and old timer)
go careening down the cliff and the next thing you know, the entire city (What
city?) is blowing up. Cut to the secret headquarters of one of the Asian
defense groups where everyone runs around in these blue and silver satin
jumpsuits that don't really provide all the support that the men employed there
obviously require. I really don't know what this group was, but their
headquarters had a big satellite dish out front, so it might have been a cable
news channel or something. In any event, the people there are spazzing out
that the world is on the verge of destruction and they use the satellite to
monitor the monsters that are attacking movements. Well, Dragon Mom interrupts
their regularly scheduled broadcast of monster mayhem to inform them that the
earth is under attack (Really?) and that she is going to be the ruler of it so
we may as well just give up. She must have thought she was broadcasting this
news conference to France or something, but these Asian guys don't wear satin
jump
suits just because it feels good against their nether regions.  There's a professor (Isn't there always?) and he's one of those Chinese dudes
with a really fake beard that seem to crop up in a lot of these 70s Hong Kong
movies (I'd hate to think that beard was real or that he wore it outside of
filming!) and he just so happens to have been working on a little project he
likes to call Infra-Man
. It soon becomes clear that the only hope any of us has
against these various monsters is for some brave soul (preferably in a satin
jump suit) to undergo the rigors, pain, and sacrifice necessary to create
Inframan (I keep wanting to type Ultraman!). This process involves some
malarkey where various things are attached to the body and there's wires and
lights and strange noises and the next thing you know this dude is decked out
in a slick red outfit, complete with helmet and bug eyes that makes you wonder
if this was Kamen Rider's Chinese cousin or something. Infra-Man
has a lot of
different powers and you'll notice that he'll only resort to using them after
about 10 minutes of kung fu fighting against the monsters. I guess he likes to
sweat a
little when he works out. While Infra-Man
is checking out his infraboots and
infragloves, the rest of the base is under attack by some creepy crawly and
by several henchmen. For some reason Dragon Mom employs a bunch of dudes on
motorcycles that wear helmets with horns and have skulls for faces. If you're
really some all-powerful being bent on destroying the human race, I would think
you could do better than hiring the Hell's Angels. Luckily the dudes in the
satin jump suits also like to speed around on motorcycles so there's plenty of
fights where everyone rides here and rides there and sometimes motorcycles
wreck and even Infra-Man
rode a motorcycle (when in human form), though I have
no idea why he wouldn't have just flown around as Infra-Man instead. Well, with
all hope seemingly lost, Infra-Man
makes his big debut to save the day, and all
the onlookers must have been reading the press releases that Infra-Man
put out
earlier in the day about his big premiere, because immediately upon seeing him,
they shout out his name, like they'd been waiting for him or something. What
follows are badly dubbed, badly shot, and badly edited kung fu battles that
leave you breathless with tedium. I know some people find all the cheap
looking sets and colorful monsters endearing, but the fighting here is just
dreadful and everything looks like outtakes from something like the Power Rangers (sans budget).  Back at the Dragon Mom hideout, which is one of those Infra-fake islands where
the mountains are shaped like the heads of dragons or something, she gets all
hot under the collar about this Infra-Man
character and they kidnap a guy to
steal the plans to Infra-Man
. He gets brainwashed and they send him back there
to get the plans, but nothing much ever seems to come out of this scheme,
except that Dragon Mom thinks Infra-Man's hands are his weakness and that he's
powered by the sun. This results in them trying to freeze Inframan later, but
luckily he remembers the professor telling him (I frankly don't recall the
conversation
myself) that if any one ever tried to freeze him to just use five
missiles on himself and that would take care of it. Boy, that professor sure
thinks of everything. The professor also has a couple of kids and they go and
somehow manage to get themselves kidnapped by Dragon Mom's monsters. I'm not
sure why these stupid kids (and at least one of them is old enough to know
better) are hanging around the office the day that Dad's work is being invaded
by demons from another dimension, or earth's past, or from outer space or
Sausalito or where ever, but they're there and they're messing around near some
rocks and suddenly they see a cave they never saw before and they all go in and
it turns out the bad guys have blown out the wall of some underground part of
the Satin Jumpsuit HQ where the power grid is at and so they fall into Dragon
Mom's clutches. She interrupts Wheel of Fortune back at the professor's office
to tell him she's got his stinky, stupid kids and that he needs to come alone
if he ever wants to see them again. He agrees, but Infra-Man
tells him he just
might happen to be in the area and that if he thinks about it, he might swing
by for a looksy. The professor is transported aboard a speedboat that the
Dragon Mom has taken the time and trouble to outfit with a couple of really cool
skull add-ons so that the boat looks like something you would let your He-Man
action
figure drive around in. With all these monsters and super powers, you're
ferrying a professor
around on a cigarette boat? Maybe later you could steal Inframan's dog or
something. Infra-Man shows up and battles Dragon Mom and a parade of baddies (I could have
sworn that the seam of one of the monster suits was clearly visible) in a
fight so
stunningly bad, you would've thought it was one of those
batters-charging-pitcher type fights that the highlight shows run (I like when
they do it with
wacky circus music playing in the background). This movie isn't any fun and I
can't believe that there would be any kid that would sit through it today.
There's enough recent movies that have better effects, better dialogue, and
better hairstyles that I think any kid watching this would get bored after
about twenty minutes and run outside and do something crazy like play with
other kids. The cheapness (this is some type of Shaw Brothers deal, much like
the cheap guano pile Horror Planet ) just smacks you in the face constantly from the total lack of story and
recognizable characters (whenever Inframan was in human form, I couldn't tell
him apart from his jump suited brethren) to the lazy design of these monsters.
Several monsters looked like someone had a bunch of foam rubber left over from
a Godzilla movie or something, stitched it up so some poor stunt guy could sweat
his balls off while flopping his arms around trying to look menacing, spray
painted it some sickly color (usually a color that I call "stool-sample
purple"),
and send it out against Infra-Man
. Once the movie was over, I had to rewind it
to make sure Inframan actually defeated Dragon Mom. I didn't remember any
exciting whipping or any woman getting body slammed by the Big I, so I thought
maybe I missed it. It turns out she transformed herself into some homely
monster-thing resembling a dragon that walks upright and doesn't do anything
except stand there while Infra-Man
chops her head off over and over until he
figures out that that ain't going to work so he just blows her up or something.
I think the fact that there was never anymore Inframan movies speaks volumes
about the true worth of this film. Unremarkable, and downright skanky
monsters, combined with a hero, who actually had a little potential (he's got
a good look and a cool name), but was so woefully underdeveloped that I still
don't understand what his powers were (why didn't he just grow really huge all
the time and step on every monster?) lead me to think fondly of my experiences
on Monster Island when my pals Godzilla and Gigan would mix it up in high
style. What about those people who give this movie kudos and words of praise?
Well, I don't think I need to say anything about where you need to be getting
your movie reviews from. If you're already here, you're smart enough to stay
away from internet geeks with arrested adolescence and bad taste.
MonsterHunter is power!
Reviews © 2004
MonsterHunter
|
|
