Invasion of the Neptune Men (1961)

- Uchu Kaisoku-sen
Very Early Sonny Chiba, 5 May 2008

To be honest, Invasion of the Neptune Men is about as bad a movie as I've seen. Maybe it's the cut of the movie I've seen or maybe something is lost in the translation from Japanese or maybe it's meant for a different age group, but whatever, it's bad. (Note: I haven't rated the movie a 1/10 because although it's bad, it's not offensively bad.) Instead of getting into the myriad of problems, I want to focus on why I've now seen The Invasion of the Neptune Men at least four times. I can think of two reasons off the top of my head to explain why I continue to re-watch Invasion of the Neptune Men.

One, (and I admit I'm pushing it here) the chance to see an early Sonny Chiba. I'm not an expert on Chiba, but what I've seen, I really like. From his work in The Street Fighter, Golgo 13, and up to and including Kill Bill, Chiba is the MAN. So it's really cool to get the chance to go back and watch him in what is really his second movie. He's barely recognizable as the lame hero, Space Chief.

Two, Invasion of the Neptune Men is one of my very favorite episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000. While I may only rate the movie a 2/10, I give this episode a 5/5 on my MST3K rating scale. Some of the riffs are laugh out loud funny no matter how many times I've heard them. The bits about Space Chef, the Hitler building, and the kids in their shorts are hysterical. As I said, I've seen this episode at least four times and can probably re-watch it many more without getting tired of it.

2/10