Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964) on Netflix

NR19641h 29mAction Adventure Fantasy

A typhoon washes a giant egg ashore, and villagers sell it to businessman Kumayama. Twin fairies ask reporters Ichiro Sakai and Junko Nakanishi to return it to Mothra, while Godzilla reawakens.

Netflix3.9/5
IMDb6.5/1012,099 votes
Rotten Tomatoes92%

Trailer

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Plot summary

Reporter Ichiro Sakai and his photographer Junko Nakanishi sort through the wreckage a typhoon left at Kurata Beach, where a strange blue-gray object lies. An enormous egg drifts in the water at Nishi Beach in Shizunoura, and the villagers there sold it to the businessman Kumayama, who means to exploit it; Professor Miura wants to examine it first. The Shobijin, tiny twin fairies, come to Kumayama and his backer Jiro Torahata and beg them to give the egg back, saying it belongs to Mothra and that the larva inside will bring destruction when it hatches. The businessmen try to capture the fairies instead. They escape and tell Sakai, Junko and Miura, who agree to help them get the egg returned.

Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)

Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.

Mothra's larvae spat silk made of liquified polystyrene. For shots of the web leaving their mouths, compressed air forced the liquid through tubes running along the larvae's backs to nozzles in their mouths, where it vaporised and solidified as it came out.
Director Ishirō Honda and composer Akira Ifukube clashed over a scene of Godzilla rising behind a ridge-line: Honda wanted aggressive music, Ifukube refused as Godzilla was "impressive enough", and Godzilla's theme was added to the scene anyway, upsetting Ifukube.
For the scene where Godzilla destroys Nagoya Castle, actor Haruo Nakajima could not completely wreck the model, so the filmmakers rebuilt it to crumble more easily and re-shot rather than use his salvage idea.
For the scenes with the tiny twin fairies the Shobijin, the crew built furniture eight times their size so the pair would appear to be 30 centimeters tall.
Special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya had Toho buy an Oxberry 1900 optical printer to repair damage in composite photography shots, and the printer was also used to create Godzilla's atomic breath.
Director Ishirō Honda rewrote much of screenwriter Shinichi Sekizawa's original script to suit his own vision, and added Sakai's speech about the brotherhood of man during filming.
A sequence featuring the United States military attacking Godzilla with Frontier Missiles was filmed for the American release of the film, but was left out of the Japanese version.
Mothra vs. Godzilla was the last film of the Godzilla franchise's Shōwa era in which Godzilla is depicted as the antagonist.