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The Whale God

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Killer Whale
Japanese name
Kanji鯨神
Transcriptions
Revised HepburnKujira Gami
Directed byTokuzō Tanaka, Chikara Komatsubara (special effect)[1]
Screenplay byKaneto Shindo
Based onThe Whale God
by Kōichirō Uno
Produced byMasaichi Nagata
Starring
CinematographySetsuo Kobayashi (jp), Toru Matoba (jp), Hiroshi Ishida
Edited byTatsuji Nakashizu
Music byAkira Ifukube
Production
company
Release date
  • July 15, 1962 (1962-07-15) (Japan)
Running time
100 minutes
CountryJapan
LanguageJapanese

The Whale God (鯨神, Kujira Gami), alternatively as Killer Whale,[2] is a 1962 Japanese tokusatsu (kaiju) film[3] produced by Daiei Film based on the 1961 Akutagawa Prize winning novel of the same name by Kōichirō Uno. It was presumably inspired by the 1851 novel Moby-Dick by Herman Melville.[4][5][6]

Plot

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In the early Meiji era, on Hirado Island, a whaling village loses many of its men to a huge North Pacific right whale over a period of years. One widow raises her sons to avenge their father and grandfather's deaths, but her elder son is also killed hunting the whale. Her younger son, Shaki, becomes a proficient whaler and the chief harpooner of the village. When one of his friends - who is engaged to Shaki's sister - leaves for Nagasaki to train as a doctor, Shaki berates him, saying no man should leave the village until the Whale God is slain.

The elder of the village promises his land, title and daughter Toyo to the man who kills the whale. Shaki accepts the challenge, but so does an outsider named Kishū from the Kishū region. After Shaki visits the elder for a private meeting in which he encourages Shaki, Toyo tells her father she doesn't want to marry Shaki. Her father admits that she won't have to, as the man who kills the Whale God will almost certainly be killed in the attempt. The villagers side with Shaki and fight Kishū a number of times, but Kishū wins every fight. He attempts to challenge Shaki, who always refuses to fight him, saying his only opponent is the Whale God.

A local peasant girl named Ei is in love with Shaki and is jealous of his presumptive betrothal to Toyo. Shaki is not interested in either woman but is fixated on the whale. After watching them together, Kishū attacks and rapes Ei. She becomes pregnant but conceals the pregnancy from everyone. Shaki's mother dies, and when his doctor friend returns from Nagasaki for the funeral, he changes his mind and encourages him to leave the village with his sister.

Shaki finds Ei attempting to give birth to her baby in secret. She gives birth to a baby boy, Jaya, who Shaki claims as his own son and marries Ei. Toyo is furious that he has humiliated her. Shaki tells Ei he doesn't care who the real father is. Kishū seems troubled by the baby's arrival. A telegram arrives reporting the Whale God's imminent arrival. In an unguarded moment, Shaki implies to Ei that he claimed Jaya as his son so that he will have someone to succeed him if the Whale God kills him. Kishū finally manages to provoke Shaki to a fight, which ends in a bruising draw.

On the hunt in the morning, the villagers entangle the Whale God with nets and repeatedly harpoon it. Kishū recklessly dives in to attack the whale personally, before it is weakened enough. He repeatedly stabs the whale in a vital spot with a harpoon, but is dragged under and drowned, his body entangled in the nets. Shaki then swims over and, despite suffering serious injuries, manages to kill the whale. The villagers decapitate it, butcher it, and leave its head on the beach.

A criticially injured Shaki demands to be taken to the head. The village elder promises to hold up his end of the bargain, but Shaki dismisses him. It is clear to Shaki that he only has hours to live and he can now see the madness which afflicted the village. Ei confesses that Kishū is Jaya's real father. Shaki says he suspected that after he saw Kishū attack the whale: it seemed that he sacrificed himself to make it easier for Shaki to kill. He asks Ei to forgive Kishū. He then lies on the beach communing with the head of the Whale God. Some distance away, Kishū's body floats unattended in the surf.

Cast

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Production

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Yonesaburo Tsukiji was originally appointed for the tokusatsu filming of The Whale God, however he was suddenly appointed for the 1962 film The Great Wall (jp), and Toru Matoba (jp) instead became a tokusatsu director for The Whale God.[7]

Despite the 1956 film Warning from Space being the first-colored tokusatsu film in Japan, both The Whale God and the 1965 film Gamera, the Giant Monster were black-and-white films due to the financial situation of Daiei Film.[7]

Manga

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The three-episode comicalization by Takao Saito was released on Weekly Bokura Magazine in January, 1979. It was later made into a Tankōbon in 2008.[8]

Legacy

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See also: Gamera

Although not strictly depicting a fictional monster (kaiju), The Whale God was the first Daiei Film production to feature a rampaging megafauna. It predates the Gamera franchise[note 1][note 2] where the successes of Gamera, the Giant Monster in 1965 and Gamera vs. Barugon presumably influenced the sudden increase of Non-Toho kaiju productions and the prosperity of the genre, while the Six-Company Agreement led by Masaichi Nagata, one of creators of Gamera, restricted non-Toho companies to easily engage in kaiju productions.[note 3] A number of film makers and actors who had participated in The Whale God later worked for Daiei Film's representative tokusatsu franchises, Gamera, Daimajin, and Yokai Monsters.[note 4][11]

Toru Matoba (jp) and Fuminori Ohashi (jp) and Ryosaku Takayama (jp) co-worked for The Whale God, and the production of Tsuburaya Productions's Ultra Q was presumably influenced by The Whale God as Matoba joined Tsuburaya Productions and Ohashi lessoned Takayama on tokusatsu techniques right after The Whale God.[12][13]

The Dai-kaiju, the right whale-based kaiju with an alias of "Whale God" from GeGeGe no Kitarō franchise, which is by Shigeru Mizuki and later yielded connections to the above-mentioned Daiei tokusatsu franchises due to Mizuki's involvements in Yokai Monsters,[14][15] was presumably influenced by The Whale God.[16] Shigeru Mizuki also made "Whale God" the right whale to appear in a non-Kitarō story Kaidan Kaeribune in 1964.[17]

The yokai manga series Mononoke Soushi by Yōsuke Takahashi has an episode The Whale God (鯨神, Kujira Gami) to feature a supernatural right whale,[18] being somewhat reminiscent of Uno's The Whale God in which the titular right whale was briefly suggested to be a supernatural being at the end.

There have been several other productions to possess same-named titles and characters with Uno's Whale God.[19][20][21]

Notes

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  1. ^ Casts and crews of The Whale God include various members, such as Akira Ifukube and Chikara Hashimoto and Kojiro Hongo and Kyoko Enami, who later participated in Gamera and Daimajin and Yokai Monsters.
  2. ^ The 1999 Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris had presumably tried to insert a reference to The Whale God as Gamera was supposed to encounter a cow-calf pair of North Pacific right whales in the final draft of the film.[9] Additionally, the 1995 book, in which Noriaki Yuasa and Niisan Takahashi and Masao Yagi participated, features a scenario based on a scrapped film due to the bankruptcy of Daiei Film for Gamera and Whale God along with Pairan and Nezura and some resurrected kaiju to protect the Earth.[10]
  3. ^ For the production of its own tokusatsu franchises, Daiei Film intentionally avoided receiving any assistance from Eiji Tsuburaya, and the sudden increase in non-Toho kaiju productions after The Whale God and Gamera, the Giant Monster made film makers suspicious of Tsuburaya's involvements in non-Toho productions such as Gappa: The Triphibian Monster (Nikkatsu) and The X from Outer Space (Shochiku) in 1967 despite the Six-Company Agreement.[11]
  4. ^ Shusuke Kaneko who is known for his involvements in the Gamera franchise, made a debut as a film director with the 1984 film Kōichirō Uno's Wet and Swinging.[12]

References

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  1. ^ 鯨神（くじらがみ） Archived 2024-07-11 at the Wayback Machine on allcinema
  2. ^ Killer Whale on FilmAffinity
  3. ^ John Squires, May 25, 2023, ‘The Whale God – Practical Killer Whale Kaiju Movie from 1962 Finally Being Unleashed in North America! Archived 2024-07-11 at the Wayback Machine, Bloody Disgusting
  4. ^ 鯨神 Archived 2024-07-11 at the Wayback Machine on Natalie
  5. ^ "鯨神（昭和37年）". Archived from the original on 2024-07-11. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  6. ^ "THE WHALE GOD Limited Edition Blu-ray Now Up For Preorder From SRS Cinema". SciFi Japan. Archived from the original on 2024-07-11. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  7. ^ a b Hisayuki Ui, January 1, 1994, From Gamera to Daimajin: all of Daiei tokusatsu films, p.64, p.72, Kindaieigasha
  8. ^ SPコミックス 鯨神 - さいとう・たかを時代劇セレクション on Books Kinokuniya
  9. ^ ASCII MEDIA WORKS, 2014, Heisei Gamera Perfection, p.264, ASCII Corporation, Kadokawa Shoten
  10. ^ OMEGA Flying Squadron, Yasuyoshi Tokuma (jp) (issuer), Noriaki Yuasa (adviser), Niisan Takahashi (adviser), Masao Yagi (jp) (adviser), 1995, Gamera is Strong!, pp.82-87, Tokuma Shoten
  11. ^ a b Shunichi Karasawa (jp), April 14, 2006, Gamera Genesis: Movie Director Noriaki Yuasa, pp.283-284, Enterbrain
  12. ^ a b Shuntaro Ono (jp), December 28, 2018, Geistesgeschichte of Gamera: From Showa to Heisei, pp.21-23, p.140, Takanashi Shobou (jp)
  13. ^ Kodansha, 1988, テレビマガジン特別編集 巨大ヒーロー大全集 (TV Magazine Special Edition: Giant Heroes Compendium), p.224
  14. ^ Hirokazu Minemori, Yusuke Watanabe (jp), 2021, The Great Yokai War: Guardians: Side Story: Heian Hyakkitan, pp.265-271, Media Works Bunko, Kadokawa
  15. ^ Natsuhiko Kyogoku, 2018, USO MAKOTO Yōkai Hyaku Monogatari, "Kyu", 373-375, p.392, Kadokawa
  16. ^ Shigeru Mizuki, 1964, Dai-kaiju Part 3 from The Secret Story, p.1, Tōkōsha (jp)
  17. ^ Shigeru Mizuki, 1964, Kaidan: Kaeribune, p.46, Tōkōsha (jp)
  18. ^ 高橋葉介傑作集　もののけ草紙　一ノ巻 Archived 2021-09-07 at the Wayback Machine on Bunkasha (jp)
  19. ^ "Satoshi Ogawa". Kyoto Seika University. Retrieved 2024-12-15.
  20. ^ "今、蘇る古の力！古代闘魚場が解禁！". Wakuwaku Fishing (jp) by Hangame. Retrieved 2024-12-15.
  21. ^ Kujiragami no Tearstilla
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