Rebirth of Mothra

The only subtitle in this entire movie

Alright it’s almost Halloween so it’s time to pop in some kaiju films and have some fun. So grab some snacks and join us as we look at one of the greatest daikaiju to ever live, Mothra.

Got those snacks? Good let's go!

So why Mothra? Well simply because we both find Mothra to be a kickass monster. She can hold her own against King Ghidorah and Godzilla, Has some awesome powers and she looks petty damn nifty doing it.

        Rebirth of Mothra is the first in a trilogy of Mothra films made around 1996. Mothra as we know her is only in the first movie and is succeeded by her son, Mothra Leo. Yea that’s right Mothra has a SON. Although the dub calls him a girl throughout the entire film. Even the film's cover says 'She's Mothra/She's back/And She's mad'. Sadly these are the only movies that have a male Mothra in them. Anyways let’s see if these films are good enough to bear the Mothra Seal of Approval.


Characters:

 The Kids: They’re your typical little kid “heroes” Annoying and useless. Moving on.
   

   The Parents: Again useless. Next
   

  Moll and Lora: Mothra's twin fairy guardians. I actually like these two. Instead of in the past where the fairies have been twin copies of each other, Moll and Lora are two different characters. They argue, and have their opinions and they dress differently too. It’s a nice change of pace.

                      Belvera: The evil fairy who wants to destroy the Earth. No reason given.






   
                            

                                           Mothra: needs no introduction
   
                              

Fairy Mothra: A tiny version of Mothra that Moll and Lora ride on.

Garu-Garu: A Dragon version of Fairy.

 

 Mothra Leo: Mothra’s Son. He kicks ass

          DesiGhidorah: A far off relative to the classic Toho monster. This version retains the classic three heads while gaining two extra legs. Sadly he doesn’t do much except for blasting whatever is near him and shaking his heads all around (Made getting a screencap of him ridiculously hard.)


The Dub:
    Sadly the only way to watch these films on DVD in America is to buy the dub version. Now I’m gonna come out and say that I hate live action dubs. They usually look and sound horrible. RoM is no exception. The little kids are annoying and stereotypical sounding. Belvera is annoying and gives me a headache. I could go on and on. Sometimes though the voices sound fine but other times it’s just makes you laugh.  Someone release a new DVD with subs please.

The Plot:
    [Insert long number here] years ago there were many, many Mothra. This Mothra “army” sealed a terrible space monster named DesiGhidorah into a stone rock and sealed with the Seal of Elias. In the present year of 1996 there is only one Mothra left and she is slowly dying. But don’t worry she conveniently just laid a giant egg (You can see where this going already can’t ya?) Anyways some forest workers discover the seal and take it. One of these workers, Mr. Gato, gives it to his daughter as a present (Oh boy). The fairies that guard Mothra, Moll and Lora, sense that the seal is gone and rush to find it.
MEANWHILE!
    The evil fairy, Belvera, is also looking for the seal so she can revive DesiGhidorah and take over the world…or something. I don’t think they ever explain that one. So anyways Belvera posses the little girl, takes the seal. Fairies come in and fight Belvera, trash the kids house, and grab the seal. OR DO THEY!? Oh wait, no they don’t. Belvera takes the seal and flies off on her mini dragon thing to revive DesiGhidorah. Moll and Lora take the two kids and their Mother (Why?) to chase after Belvera. I guess the Mother comes along so they can buy that plane ticket since The Fairies mini Mothra (Oddly enough named Fairy) got hurt in the battle with Belvera. What can revive him/her? The Seal of Elias of course.
    So Belvera revives DesiGhidorah, shit hit’s the fan. The usual. DesiGhidorah sounds like an elephant, seriously watch the movie and tell me that is not a 3 headed, 4 legged elephant you’re looking at.
So Moll (Did they really have to name her Moll? Is it sort for Molly? Whatever, moving on) and Lora bicker with one another as to whether or not they should summon Mothra (One of them says “Mothra’s too old!). Wow that’s a nice thing to say to your guardian. But of course they summon Mothra by, how else, a music video! Yea I’m not even kidding.

This could have been on MTV

So the classic Mothra song plays and she shows up to kick some ass, right?


                                      
                        

Oh.....Fuck

      So yea Mothra dies. Oh and in the middle of the fighting the Egg hatched and Baby Leo watched his Mom die. How sweet. So Leo swims, somehow, to a remote island where he turns into a cocoon. We get another music video and than butterflies appear! And what do the butterflies do? They form Mothra Leo!…somehow.  I use that word way too much. So Mothra Leo kicks DesiGhidorah’s ass and saves the day! But not before restoring all the poor trees who lost their lives during the rampage. Oh and we find out that Belvera is Moll and Lora’s evil sister (What a shocker). Oh and Belvera escapes (I smell a sequel).

    So that’s Rebirth of Mothra 1. It’s not a bad film at all. In fact I like it. However it doesn’t feel like a typical kaiju flick. We hardly see the military, the monsters never fight in the city and it feels really weird at times. The kids and their parents play almost no part in the film. If they were cut out it probably would have been a better movie. There was no need for them. All they do is crawl around and shout “MOTHRA!” The little girl barely ever talks at all. She screams though. A lot.
     DesiGhidorah’s goal is to “suck energy out of the planet.” So I guess it’s one of those “You must cherish the Earth” kinda films. That would explain why Mothra and Ghidorah only fight in forests and mountains. This film sucks as a “save the Earth” sort of film but as a Kaiju film it ain’t half bad. Some comments I’ve seen on sites such as IMDB call this film a “Little Kid’s film” or a “Disney version of Mothra” and I think that’s going a bit too far. Yea it’s a kids film but aren’t most Godzilla films? Still the effects are good and there’s lots of explodsions. Certaintly there are worse monster films out there (Godzilla vs. Hedorah for example) If you like Mothra than check it out. Hopefully the sequels fare better.

It was a robot. It's always been a robot.