When a Babylonian vampire comes to old Japan, an army of Japanese demons and ghosts gather and battle him.When a Babylonian vampire comes to old Japan, an army of Japanese demons and ghosts gather and battle him.When a Babylonian vampire comes to old Japan, an army of Japanese demons and ghosts gather and battle him.
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Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaTakashi Miike made a loose remake of this movie in 2005 called "The Great Yokai War"
- ConnectionsFollowed by Yokai Monsters: Along with Ghosts (1969)
Featured review
Hallucinatory Japanese oddity
In this sequel of sorts to 1968's 'Yokai: 100 Monsters' ('Yôkai hyaku monogatari'), scavengers digging in Babylonia disturb that which should not be disturbed and release Daimon (Chikara Hashimoto), a murderous, shape-changing, blood-sucking demon. The fiend flies to feudal Japan, where it kills, then takes the form of, local lord Hyogo Isobe (Takashi Kanda), and begins to spread terror. Affronted, the local yôkai ('spirits', referred to 'apparitions' in the English subtitles) challenge the malignant creature and a phantasmagorical war begins. Despite a few gory moments, the film is a children's fantasy with monsters that are more funny than scary. Many of the yôkai are drawn from Japanese folklore (including among others: a Kappa (water sprite), a Futakuchi-onna (two-faced woman), a Rokurokubi (a woman with a long, snake like neck) and a Kasa-obake (an animate umbrella creature (in this case, with a tongue like Gene Simmons!)). The monster costumes (and the Kasa-obake puppet) are a bit silly looking but surprisingly endearing and the story of yôkai's battle with the iniquitous Daimon is fun and engaging. The human characters, including Isobe's pretty daughter Lady Chie (Akane Kawasaki) and samurai Shinpachiro (Yoshihiko Aoyama), are secondary to the 'apparitions' but are well played (considering the genre and the material). The final scene, where the army of 'apparitions' dance off into the clouds is oddly affecting. For a children's film, there was some strong language (e.g. 'pissed') in the English-subtitled version I watched. As well, there were a number of translation errors ('kit's' for 'kids' occurred a number of times). After years of movies about elves, trolls, gnomes etc., I found watching a fantasy that embodied mythological beings from a non-Western-European culture both entertaining and fascinating and am looking forward to watching the third film in the trilogy: 'Yokai Monsters: Along With Ghosts' (1969). As of this writing, all three films are available on You-tube.
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- jamesrupert2014
- Jan 31, 2019
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Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Yokai Monsters: Spook Warfare
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
- Runtime1 hour 19 minutes
- Aspect ratio
- 2.35 : 1
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