Matango (1963)
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Attack of the Mushroom PeopleMatango (マタンゴ) is a 1963 tokusatsu kaiju film produced by Toho, loosely based on the 1907 short story "The Voice in the Night" by William Hope Hodgson. It was released to Japanese theaters on August 11, 1963.
Plot
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The movie begins in Tokyo, where a man travels to visit a professor who is being held in the psychiatric ward of a hospital. He tells the man that what happened to him sounded crazy but that he in fact was not insane.
A Japanese yacht on a day trip encounters a nasty storm that nearly capsizes it. The crew and passengers include the skipper Naoyuki, his shipmate assistant Senzô, writer Etsurô Yoshida, university professor Kenji, celebrity Masafumi Kasai (the owner of the yacht) and two female passengers, professional singer Mami and student Akiko. The storm leaves their ship in ruin. Without a rudder or sails to steer by, they are forced adrift. A few days after hearing a radio announcement that they were lost at sea, the group arrive at a seemingly deserted island. After spending a day in search of food and water, they come across ponds that seem manmade, full of fresh rain water along with a seemingly endless forest of mushrooms. However, Naoyuki warns them not to eat the mushrooms, as they may be poisonous.
As they cross the island, they come across a shipwreck on the shore. Although it seems to have only been there about a year, the sails are rotted and the ship's interior is covered with a mysterious fungus and mold that has spread throughout the ship. Noticing that the mold succumbs to strong cleansing products, they work to clear it from the ship. In doing so, they begin to suspect that the ship had been involved in some sort of nuclear testing of the polluted waters, forcing gross mutations on various objects including mushrooms. As the days pass, the group begins to grow restless as their supply of food stores start to run low. They try to acquire turtle eggs and birds, though this proves difficult as birds seem to actively avoid the island. With Kasai refusing to help find a way off the island and instead stealing from the food stores, Yoshida begins to get edgy, eventually eating the mushrooms on the island instead of eating the potatoes and seaweed they are able to find to sustain themselves.
One night, as Kasai is raiding the food stores, he is attacked by a grotesque-looking man who promptly disappears after encountering the group, leading them to believe that something is very wrong with the island. Shortly after Yoshida and Kasai fight over Mami's affections, Yoshida goes crazy as a direct result of the mushrooms' influence and pulls a gun on the men. When he is locked in Kasai's room. Naoyuki decides that they must leave the island in order to survive, but the others disagree, so he departs on his own. Mami frees Yoshida and they attempt to take over the ship, shooting and killing Senzô in the process. Kenji and Akiko manage to wrest control from them and force them off the ship. Kasai travels out to the yacht only to find Naoyuki missing and a note left behind, explaining that Naoyuki is responsible for the deaths of the group and that he has jumped overboard. On his way back, Kasai is confronted by Mami, who entices him to follow her into the forest. Perpetual rainfall had caused wild fungal growth, and Kasai realizes that those who had been eating the mushrooms turned into mushrooms themselves. Due to its addictive nature, no one can escape the mushrooms once they take a bite. Kasai is last seen collapsing as mushroom beings swarm him.
Meanwhile, Akiko and Kenji are attacked in force by the mushroom people. They are separated and Akiko is kidnapped. As Kenji tracks her down, he discovers that she has been fed mushrooms and is under their influence along with Mami, Yoshida and Kasai. Kenji attempts to rescue Akiko but he is overwhelmed by the mushrooms and flees without her, making his way onto the yacht and escaping the island.
Several days pass before Kenji is finally rescued. As he waits, he begins to wonder if he should have stayed with Akiko on the island. He turns toward the audience, his face covered in fungal growth, and states that it wouldn't have made a difference if he had stayed or not, but he would have been happier there with his love. The screen fades as Kenji notes that humans are not much different than the mushroom people, and the camera pans over a night-lit Tokyo.
Staff
Staff role on the left, staff member's name on the right.
- Directed by Ishiro Honda
- Screenplay by Takeshi Kimura
- Story Treatment by Shinichi Hoshi, Masami Fukashima
- Based on the short story "The Voice in the Night" by William Hope Hodgson
- Produced by Tomoyuki Tanaka
- Music by Sadao Bekku
- Cinematography Hajime Koizumi
- Edited by Reiko Kaneko
- Production Design by Shigekazu Ikuno
- Director of Special Effects Eiji Tsuburaya
- Assistant Director of Special Effects Teruyoshi Nakano
- Special Effect Photography by Sadamasa Arikawa, Mototaka Tomioka
- Optical Photography by Yoichi Manoda, Yoshiyuki Tokusama
- Art Direction by Akira Watanabe
- Lighting by Kyuichiro Kishida
- Matte Processing by Hiroshi Mukoyama
- Production Management by Tadashi Koike
- Still Photography by Issei Tanaka
Cast
Actor's name on the left, character played on the right.
- Akira Kubo as Kenji Murai
- Kumi Mizuno as Mami Sekiguchi
- Hiroshi Koizumi as Naoyuki Sakuta
- Kenji Sahara as Senzô Koyama
- Hiroshi Tachikawa as Etsurô Yoshida
- Yoshio Tsuchiya as Masafumi Kasai
- Miki Yashiro as Akiko Sôma
- Hideyo Amamoto as Skulking Transitional Matango
- Takuzô Kumagai as Jirô Kumagai
- Akio Kusama as Police Personnel
- Yutaka Oka as Doctor
- Keisuke Yamada as Doctor
- Kazuo Hinata as Police Personnel
- Katsumi Tezuka as Police Personnel
- Haruo Nakajima as Matango
- Tokio Ôkawa as Matango
- Kôji Uruki as Matango
- Masaki Shinohara as Matango
- Kuniyoshi Kashima as Transitional Matango
- Toku Ihara as Transitional Matango
- Mitsuko Hayashi as Nurse
- Tsurue Ichimanji as Tazue Ichimanji
- Hiroshi Akitsu as Guest at club
- Ryûtarô Amami as Guest at club
- Saburô Iketani as Voice of radio announcer
- Yoshio Katsube as Guest at club
- Hideo Shibuya as Staff at club
Appearances
Monsters
Gallery
- Main article: Matango (film)/Gallery.
Soundtrack
- Main article: Matango (Soundtrack).
Alternate Titles
- Attack of the Mushroom People (United States)
- Matango: Attack of the Mushroom People (U.S. DVD Title)
- Matango, Fungus of Terror (United Kingdom)
- Matango, the Monster (Matango, il Mostro; Italy)
Theatrical Releases
- Japan - August 11, 1963
- Thailand - 1964
- Columbia - 1960s
- United Kingdom - 1969
- Italy - November 1973
U.S. Release
In 1965, American International Pictures released Matango directly to television as Attack of the Mushroom People, using Toho's international English dub recorded in Hong Kong. Aside from a shortened opening credit sequence, it was largely unedited. Used TV prints of this version found their way to public domain dealers who issued it on Betamax and VHS. In 2005, Media Blasters' Tokyo Shock label released the original Japanese version of the film on DVD under the title Matango: Attack of the Mushroom People.
Video Releases
Toho DVD (2003)
- Region: 2
- Discs: 1
- Audio: Japanese
- Subtitles: Japanese
- Special Features: Audio commentary by actor Akira Kubo, interview with Teruyoshi Nakano (27 minutes), reading of the original treatment by writer Masami Fukushima (18 minutes), theatrical trailer
Media Blasters DVD (2005)[1]
- Region: 1
- Discs: 1
- Audio: Japanese (2.0 Mono, 5.1 Surround), English (2.0 Mono, 5.1 Surround)
- Subtitles: English
- Special Features: Audio commentary by actor Akira Kubo, interview with Teruyoshi Nakano (27 minutes), reading of the original treatment by writer Masami Fukushima (18 minutes), trailers
- Notes: Out of print. A 2007 release packages it with Varan and The Mysterians.
Videos
Trailers
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Miscellaneous
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Trivia
- American director Steven Soderbergh discussed remaking Matango with Toho, but was unable to reach an agreement with the studio.[2]
External Links
References
This is a list of references for Matango (film). These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this: [1]
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