Latitude Zero (film)
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| Latitude Zero | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical poster for Latitude Zero (1969) |
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| Directed by | Ishirō Honda |
| Produced by | Don Sharp Tomoyuki Tanaka |
| Written by | Warren Lewis Shinichi Sekizawa Ted Sherdeman |
| Starring | Joseph Cotten Cesar Romero Akira Takarada Masumi Okada Richard Jaeckel Patricia Medina Mari Nakayama Akihiko Hirata Wataru Omae Hikaru Kuroki Linda Haynes Susumu Kurobe Haruo Nakajima |
| Music by | Akira Ifukube |
| Cinematography | Taiichi Kankura |
| Editing by | Ume Takeda |
| Distributed by | Toho National General Pictures (USA) |
| Release date(s) | July 26, 1969 (Japan) July 29, 1969 (Dallas) December 4, 1970 (New York) |
| Running time | 108 min. (Japan) 99 min. (USA) |
| Language | Japanese |
| IMDb profile | |
Latitude Zero (緯度0大作戦 Ido zero daisakusen?), is a 1969 tokusatsu film. It was directed by Ishiro Honda with special effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. The story was written by Ted Sherdeman, writer on the 1954 science-fiction film, Them!, and starred Joseph Cotten Cesar Romero, Akira Takarada, Masumi Okada, Richard Jaeckel, Patricia Medina, and Akihiko Hirata.
The film was shot in English, with the Japanese actors, such as Akira Takarada, having learned their lines phonetically. In spite of this , the U.S. release is still eleven minutes shorter.
Latitude Zero is a paradise hidden fifteen miles below the surface at the intersection of the Equator and the International Date Line. Gold is plentiful there and is used for protective clothing by the island's newcomers, while those who arrived in the nineteenth century prefer to dress as they are accustomed, as no one ages or dies. Diamonds are very common and used only in industrial use.
Dr. Malic (Romero), however, wishes to destroy the paradise of Latitude Zero, and used giant rats and anthropomorphic bats in addition to James Bond-style devices against the undersea kingdom. worst of all, after a cruel experiment grafting the wings of an eagle to a lion, he removes the brain of his former ally, Tsuruko Okada (Mari Nakayama) and places her brain in it, which proves to be his undoing.
Of all the visitors to Latitude Zero, only Perry Lawton (Jaeckel), a journalist, wishes to return home. He wakes up aboard a ship piloted by Lt. Hastings (Romero again), horrified at who he sees, he opens the pouch where he placed his complimentary diamonds to find tobacco. Just as he is about to resign himself to the fact that his adventure never occurred, the ship is wired a message stating that a cache of diamonds has been deposited in his name in a safe deposit box in New York City.
[edit] References
- Greenspun, Roger. "City Under Sea" (film review) The New York Times. December 5, 1970.
- Variety Weekly. September 9, 1969.
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