Ujugoe-in wangmagwi

Ah, Korea. Land of cheap second-rate knockoffs. Can't afford a Honda? Get a Hyundai. Can't afford an Apple iPhone? Get a Galaxy phone. Can't afford a high end appliance? Settle for something from Samsung. You get the idea.

And so it was with their monster movies, too. "Space Monster Wangmagwi" is a cheap second-rate knockoff designed to compete with Japan's much higher quality Godzilla films. But honestly, there's no competition. It's not even in the same ballpark. Even the worst Godzilla movie is a masterpiece compared to this.

If you were to ask a 4 year old to draw a monster you'd get something like Wangmagwi -- a man-shaped monster with gigantic triangular teeth that protrude from an oversized lumpy head. It's hard to believe adults designed it and thought it was great because it's so juvenile and ridiculous. At least Godzilla had a cool lizard body with a long tail and breathed fire and stuff. Wangmagwi is just a dude walking around in an ill-fitting baggy suit, blinking his eyes and waving his arms menacingly.

There is also far too much attempt at comedy, which falls flat every time and goes on far too long. And all the scenes of the running screaming townsfolk never have Wangmagwi looming over them in the background like Godzilla does, either, which is very off-putting and confusing. Plus the boy with the knife, who I suppose is meant to be the hero, is annoying and hyperactive and psychotic. He sneaks into the monsters ear canal, slices through his eardrum (ouch) and somehow ends up in its nose. These scenes are so random and disjointed you watch them and just think "Huh?".

I have to admit that the miniatures and buildings in the city rampage scenes were first-rate! There were many times I thought the buildings and cityscapes and street scenes were real, that they relied on low-angles or forced perspective in an actual town. But nope, they were just well-lit and well-built miniatures that looked very real and impressive. As did the scenes of the boy and bride rolling around in the fake hand "high above" the city. Those looked very real, too. Guess the filmmakers took the prop hand to the top of a tall building, put the actors in it and shook it around, and filmed over the edge to convey height, much like Harold Lloyd did back in the 30's. Very clever and pretty darn realistic!

All in all "Wangmagwi" is a weird little monster movie, but not in a "so bad it's fun" way. Stick with Godzilla.

Aliens planning on conquering Earth send a monster down to the Korean peninsula to start the process. This Korean response to the lucrative Godzilla films being made across the Sea of Japan is a silly adventure designed for a juvenile audience, with a heroic youngster, slapstick (and occasionally scatological) humour, and lots of monster mayhem (all in all, not that unlike contemporaneous Japanese kaiju offerings, especially the Gamera franchise). The crude and simplistic space-monster costume is an underwhelming example of 'suit-mation' but some of the miniature sets are remarkably good and the alien spaceship is more imaginative than usual for the genre (the aliens themselves are laughable). There is little to the storyline: for the most part the monster wanders aimlessly through the streets of Seoul (I assume), knocking over buildings and stepping on cars (and people) while carrying a young women whose wedding its arrival interrupted. Defensive measures are taken (via lots of stock footage of Korean F-86 Sabre jets) but, needless to say, mankind's puny weapons have no effect. The film takes a delirious turn when an intrepid and resourceful young lad decides to take on the beast armed only with a knife. This leads to a 'Fantastic Voyage' type adventure as the kid sneaks into the monster's ear-canal, cuts his way through the tympanic membrane, and eventually makes his way to the creature's nose, managing not to fall to his death through the nostrils by grabbing on to what I can only assume are kaiju-sized nose-hairs. If you are in the right mood, some of this is entertainingly silly but most of the scenes go on too long (especially the 'comic' side-plot about two cowards betting who is braver), the antics of the boy-hero get tiresome after a while, and the premise that the abducted bride can be safely carried in one hand by the rampaging creature quickly become ludicrous (admittedly the implication that the towering horror is leering at the torn bodice of her wedding dress is an amusing touch). This was the second Korean attempt at a kaiju outing (the first being the lost 'Bulgasari' (1962)) and predates number three, the more typical and better known (but not much better) 'Yongary, Monster from the Deep', by a few months. Definitely a must-see for kaiju life-listers and some of the weirder parts lifts the opus a couple of inches from the bottom of the kaiju-barrel. Watched on Tubi with English sub-titles.

Space Monster Wangmagwi is a fun ride, especially if you're a diehard Kaiju fan, particularly during the Showa era. The film was inspired by the likes of Godzilla and King Kong during the massive kaiju boom of the sixties and seventies. Definitely not without its faults, but this was a very enjoyable film for me. Considered lost for many years, it survived in Korean archives and would be shown here and there, but not often. I have been a kaiju fan for 30+ years and grew up on Showa era Godzilla films and I also run a Kaiju podcast called Kaiju Karnage. By no means does that make me an authority on these classic films, just making the point that I love these type of films. If you love these old classic kaiju/science fiction films as much as I do, give this film a shot.