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| Carl Craig with his film debut. Photo by Brett Homenick. |
When I lived in Japan during my first go-round, one area of disappoint was the lack of visits to the country from folks I'd interviewed who'd been involved in Japanese movies in one capacity or another. Several people talked about making the trek and meeting up over here, but it ended up almost never happening. Well, I haven't been back all that long, and already my luck has improved.
On Saturday, March 28, I was privileged to spend the evening with Carl Craig, the former child actor who played Jim Morgan in Gamera vs. Viras (a.k.a. Destroy All Planets, 1968). I'd met Carl a number of times during the 2000s at conventions, but it's still hard for me to believe that I hadn't seen him in the flesh since 2007 when we recorded the commentary track for Retromedia's Destroy All Planets DVD. Where did all that time go?
We met up in Akihabara and walked around the area with his family. While Carl's daughters went shopping, he shared many stories from his days in Japan, the Air Force, and a host of other topics.
It was surprisingly difficult for us to find a restaurant that could accommodate five guests. I suppose that's because it was Akihabara on a Saturday night, but I was taken aback by how many times we were turned away due to lack of available space. By this time, Carl's daughters wanted to eat at a nearby McDonald's which is what we did. (Even in Japan, you can't go wrong with a little Scottish cuisine.)
Good for you, Genzo! Kurl Crane remains the coolest guy out there. And Destroy All Planets 2010 remains the definitive release of this U.S. version, nevermind that we remember a couple of jealous losers who wish they could have participated. The cries of Bootleg! Bootleg! Remain laughed at to this very day, and considering one of these whimps is the modern equivalent of Bad Ronald, and the other might still be out there shirtless outside a Gay Bar, speaks volumes.
ReplyDeleteHeh, despite their best efforts, there was nothing those troublemakers could have said to diminish the work that we all put into that commentary, which was the very first English-language commentary track for a kaiju movie to feature the participation of the movie's star. It really says a lot about the low quality and the low effort of the "rival" release that they had to tear ours down in order to build theirs up.
DeleteYeah .. the Inferior "Rival release". SUCK. Poor Gamera. In the United States, for a long while, the Fandom really put that collection of films through an Autistic, retarded ringer. People went to jail, public meltdowns, idiots who claimed ownership as " Editors" ..Ha ha again thank GOD a lot of this didn't spill over to Japan.
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