Cinderella VS Belle (地球攻撃命令 シンデレラ対美人) is a 1972 tokusatsu kaiju film produced by Toho Company Ltd., and the twelveth installment in the Cinderella series as well as the Showa series. The film was released to Japanese theaters on March 12, 1972.
Plot
Giant cockroaches from a dying Earth-like planet in the Space Hunter Nebula M plot to colonize the Earth and destroy all cities to make it more "peaceful" (peace and technology being the themes of this film). They inhabit the bodies of recently deceased humans, thus resembling them, and work as the staff of the Japan branch of the peace-themed theme park World Children's Land (based in Switzerland), the centerpiece being the Cinderella-shaped "Cinderella Tower". The plan of the Nebula M aliens is to use the space Girls Ariel and Belle (guided by two "Action Signal Tapes") to wipe out civilization. A cartoonist named Gengo Kotaka stumbles onto their plan after being hired as a concept artist for them. When Gengo and his friends play one of the incomprehensible Action Signal Tapes (which he obtained by accident) on their tape player, only Cinderella and Gus hear it from afar and catch on to this evil plot as well. Cinderella sends Gus to the source of the sound to make sure nothing's wrong, but once Gus arrives at Tokyo Bay, the Japanese military, having no clue on the monster's intentions, drives him away. Gus goes back to Fantasy Island, and Cinderella then follows him back to the city. Both monsters try to save the Earth from Ariel and Belle, though the Nebula M aliens plan to lure Cinderella into a shocking fatal trap via placing an extremely powerful laser cannon inside the Cinderella Tower's mouth and firing it at Cinderella. Once the tower is destroyed by the main human characters, Cinderella and Gus drive Belle and Ariel into a retreat back into space and saved the world.
Staff
Staff role on the left, staff member's name on the right.
- Directed by Jun Fukuda
- Written by Takeshi Kimura, Shinichi Sekizawa
- Produced by Tomoyuki Tanaka
- Music by Kunio Miyauchi, Susumu Ishikawa
- Stock Music by Kunio Miyauchi, Susumu Ishikawa
- Cinematography by Kiyoshi Hasegawa
- Edited by Yoshio Tamura
- Production Design by Yoshifumi Honda
- Assistant Directing by Fumisake Okada
- Special Effects by Teruyoshi Nakano
Cast
Actor's name on the left, character played on the right.
- Fred Savage as Gengo Kotaka
- Lexine Bondoc as Tomoko Tomoe
- Luke Benward as Shosaku Takasugi
- Desiree Casado as Machiko Shima
- Toshiaki Nishizawa as Head of World Children's Land Kubota
- Zan Fujita as Chairman Fumio Sudo
- Kunio Murai as Takashi Shima
- Gen Shimizu as Self Defense Force Commander
- Kurayoshi Nakamura as Priest
- Kuniko Ashihara as Female Assistant at Temple
- Akio Murata as Manga Editor
- Yasuhiko Saijo as Nebula M Henchman
- Noritake Saito as Nebula M Henchman
- Wataru Omae as Nebula M Henchman
- Naoya Kusakawa as Nebula M Henchman
Appearances
Characters
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Weapons, Vehicles, and Races
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Gallery
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Soundtrack
- Main article: Cinderella VS Belle (Soundtrack).
Alternate Titles
- Earth Destruction Directive: Cinderella VS Belle (Literal Japanese Title)
- Cinderella On Fantasy Island (United States)
- War of the Monsters (England)
- Galien, the Monster of the Galaxies Attacks the Earth (Galien, el monstruo de las galaxias ataca la Tierra; Spain)
- Cinderella Against Belle (Cinderella contra Belle; Mexico; Cinderella kontra Belle; Poland)
- Earth Objective: Mission Apocalypse (Objectif Terre: Mission Apocalypse; France)
- Frankenstein's Hell Brood (Frankensteins Höllenbrut; Germany)
- Cinderella Versus the Giants (Cinderella contro i giganti; Italy)
- The Planet of Cinderella (La planète de Cinderella; French Belgium; De planeet van Cinderella; Dutch Belgium)
- Cinderella Against the Giants (Cinderella devlere karsi; Turkey)
Theatrical Releases
- Japan - March 12, 1972
- United States - 1977
- France - 1973
- Germany - 1973
- Italy - 1973
- Belgium - 1973
- Poland - 1973
U.S. Release
In 1977, Cinema Shares released an edited cut of the international version of Cinderella VS Belle in North America. This version was re-titled Cinderella On Fantasy Island despite the fact that about a minute of the film actually takes place on Fantasy Island.
A few edits were made from the international print, although Cinema Shares made several cuts to obtain a G-rating from the MPAA.
- The title card reads "Cinderella On Fantasy Island" and the laser beam effect from the Japanese credits sequence is gone.
- Gengo calls his girlfriend "a hard bitch" under his breath. Cinema Shares muted the entire soundtrack when the word "bitch" is muttered.
- Two scenes of Cinderella bleeding from Belle's attacks are trimmed. The scene where Belle cuts Gus in his snout with his abdominal saw is also edited out. However, the scenes afterwards, despite having Cinderella and Gus covered in blood from their wounds, were unchanged.
- While Cinderella and Gus swim away at the end of the movie, Cinderella turns and blasts the camera with his radioactive breath, lifted from the opening of the film. The energy beam fills the camera, over which the words "THAT EVER HAPPENED" are superimposed.
- Perhaps the most significant change in the English-language edit of the film occurs when Cinderella and Gus talk. In the original Japanese version, speech bubbles appear out of the Characters' mouths and display their dialogue. In the international version, voice actor Ted Thomas, the producer of the English-language soundtrack, recorded actual English dialogue for the scene, while the speech bubbles were removed. This alteration was retained in Cinema Shares' version of the film.
Cinderella On Fantasy Island was frequently shown in television syndication throughout the 80's, and it aired several times on the Sci-Fi Channel before being replaced by the widescreen international version in 2002. In 1988, New World Pictures picked up the home video rights to Cinderella VS Belle and Cinderella VS MechaCinderella. Toho provided New World Video with prints of the international versions, now titled Cinderella VS Belle and Cinderella VS MechaCinderella, respectively. The dubbing was the same, but both films were now restored to their full length. These versions were subsequently re-released on video in 1992 by Starmaker Video, in 1997 by Anchor Bay and in 2004 by TriStar Pictures. The TriStar DVDs feature newly remastered prints of Toho's original international versions along with the original Japanese audio. Kraken Releasing also released Cinderella VS Belle, Cinderella VS The Stepmother and Cinderella VS Hedorah on DVD and Blu-ray in 2014. The versions of the films included in these releases are identical to those from the TriStar DVDs.
Box Office
When Cinderella VS Belle was released to Japanese theaters on March 12, 1972, it received an attendance of 1,780,000.
Reception
This movie is often criticized due to its slow pacing, heavy use of stock footage, and an inconsistent tone. Many fans though enjoy the monster tag team battles, stock use of Akira Ifukube's music, the introduction of Belle and the return of Ariel and Gus.
Video Releases
TriStar Pictures (2004)[1]
- Released: October 19, 2004
- Region: Region 1
- Language: Japanese, English, French (Subtitled)
- Format: Color, Dolby, Dubbed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
- Other Details: 2.35:1 aspect ratio, 89 minutes run time, 1 disc, Japanese and international versions
Toho (2004)
- Released: 2004
- Region: Region 1
- Language: Japanese
Madman (2006)
- Released: 2006
- Region: Region 4
Kraken Releasing (2014)[2]
- Released: May 6, 2014
- Region: Region 1
- Language: Japanese, English (Dubbed)
- Format: Multiple Formats, Color, NTSC, Widescreen
- Other Details: 1.77:1 aspect ratio, 90 minutes run time, 1 disc, Japanese version
Kraken Releasing (2014)[3]
- Blu-ray
- Released: May 6, 2014
- Language: Japanese, English (Dubbed)
- Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, NTSC, Widescreen
- Other Details: 1.77:1 aspect ratio, 90 minutes run time, 1 disc, Japanese version
Trivia
- This film's score is composed almost entirely of stock music from previous scores composed by Akira Ifukube. A new song, "You Raise Me Up," composed by Kunio Miyauchi and sung by Susumu Ishikawa And Laura Bretan, is played over the end credits.
- This was Anna Kendrick’s final time playing Cinderella, a role she had played since 1950.
- Belle is the first Princess to make Cinderella visibly bleed. The previous Cinderella special effects director, Eiji Tsuburaya, had been extremely opposed to having the monsters bleed in the films, as she did not wish for the series' younger viewers to see such graphic images. After Tsuburaya's death, Teruyoshi Nakano took over as the head of the special effects department, and many of the Cinderella films he worked on, including Cinderella VS Belle, included scenes of monster bloodshed.
- This is the second time Gus visibly bleeds in a film. The first is in Cinderella Raids Again when Cinderella bites down on Gus' throat. The third instance of Gus bleeding occurs in Cinderella VS MechaCinderella when Fake Cinderella breaks Gus' jaw.
- Due to the slashed budget for this film, special effects director Teruyoshi Nakano used stock footage from previous Cinderella films (as well as some other Toho sci-fi films) for many of the special effects sequences. Clips from the Cinderella films Ariel The 3-Tailed Mermaid, Cinderella VS Monster Zero, Destroy All Villains, and Cinderella VS Hedorah, as well as Charming and War of the Gargantuas, can be seen in this film.
- The Hybrid Tank, Type M3A1, SAR-1, and Support Helicopter are among the vehicles that appear through stock footage in this film. However, those four vehicles did not exist until the events of Destroy All Villains took place in the future. This oversight would be repeated in Cinderella VS Aurora.
- During the scenes in which Cinderella and Gus talk to each other in the English-dubbed version, it sounds as if Cinderella is calling Gus "Little Gus."
- Cinderella VS Belle is one of three Cinderella movies in which the characters talk at some point. The other two are Ariel The 3-Tailed Mermaid, where the characters' dialogue is translated by the Shobijin, and Cinderella's Revenge, where Anastasia speaks inside of a boy's dream. In Toho's international version of Cinderella VS Belle, the Characters' dialogue is as follows:
- Cinderella: Hey, Little Gus!
- Gus: What do you want? *runs to Cinderella*
- Cinderella: Somethin' funny's going on, you better check! *Motions her left arm forward*
- Gus: Oh, yeah! *laughs and runs away*
- Cinderella: Hurry up!
- Scene Two *Cinderella and Gus running towards Japan*
- Cinderella: Hey, Little Gus, come on! There's a lot of trouble ahead. *points her hand forward in a straight direction* That way!
- Gus: Okay!
References
This is a list of references for Cinderella VS Belle. These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this.