A sailor is guiding his boat through a storm when he notices something has slithered in through the windows and is approaching him - tentacles belonging to a giant octopus! He tries to call the Captain, but to no avail as the appendages wrap themselves around him and drag him towards the creature when suddenly they relax their grip and let him go. He slumps to the floor only to see a huge humanoid battling the octopus, giving him and his fellow crewmembers a chance to abandon ship. Yet he will be the only survivor and when he washes up on the shore nobody will believe him...
Naturally they believe him when they all realise they are in the middle of a giant monster movie, which War of the Gargantuas, or Furankenshutain no kaijû: Sanda tai Gaira as it was known in Japan, was. It was brought to the world by Ishirô Honda, the man behind Godzilla and while all the expected elements were there, this was actually not a sequel to one of those efforts starring the big green guy, but a sequel to Frankenstein Conquers the World, although this plot point would be lost on viewers of the English language version because the American importers chose to ignore that.
So it is assumed to be the return of the giant "Frankenstein" from the first movie who battled the octopus, and soon after attacks an airport, only fleeing when the sun appears from behind a cloud. This odd behaviour can be explained by the monster's aversion to bright light, which results in much of the film, and certainly the epic battles, shot in a gloom that does the action few favours when it's hard to see what exactly is going on (although it doesn't take a brain surgeon to work it out). But where did this beast come from?
There are a group of scientists led by American Dr Paul Stewart (Russ Tamblyn) who think they know, because they had a small version of a Gargantua in their possession when it broke free and went on the run - so that's who is responsible! Science run amok, we might have known. Tamblyn is the imported star here, but you'll wish he hadn't bothered making the trip across the Pacific as he is patently disinterested in the whole affair, barely registering any emotion and you can imagine him delivering his lines on the set in a bored monotone. The film would have been better off with an all-Japanese cast.
And that also goes for the nighclub singer in one infamous scene, Kipp Hamilton, who performs a truly dreadful tune called "The Words Get Stuck in My Throat" to a polite audience who only start screaming in terror when a Gargantua shows up and grabs the chanteuse - having heard it you might have expected them to react this way long before that. At least it stops her singing. Back at the monster business, and it turns out there are two - count 'em - two giant creatures, one a sort of clone of the other so we can get that great big fight we have been anticipating. One of them, the original, is a nice guy and even tries to help his brother when he is felled by lasers, but to no avail as this evil one is intent on destruction. This film doesn't have "War" in the title for nothing, as it's a decidedly military-minded film, far more so than usual for this type of thing, though it should prove reliable entertainment for fans. Music by Akira Ifukube.
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