Since the first appearance of Godzilla at 1954, part of the Japanese
film industry was focused on the production of fantasy films featuring giant
monsters. Many of these films were located in mysterious islands where all kind
of weird creatures lived. Although the production company Toho Film was the
main and most productive company doing those kind of movies, the great forerunner
of these films was certainly King-Kong
(1933) and the Skull island.
As in the iconic American film, the Japanese used
matte paintings to show the long shots of the islands. Although sometimes it was
a miniature island matted in. The matte painting was usually uncredited on Japanese
films and I’m not really sure who painted what. I have found some names
credited for matte work, or matte shots, but I suspect most of these names are
from camera operators.
The first one at the Japanese Fantasy islands was
black and white for Godzilla (1954)
Special visual effect: Eiji Tsurubaya
Matte work: Hiroshi Mukoyama
Two beautiful colour paintings of the island from Mosura
(1961)
This time, no mention of matte work or matte
process on the credit. VFX again under the master Eiji Tsurubaya.
Another Toho Film, this time associated with
Universal for the making of King Kong versus Godzilla (1962) with Eiji
Surabaya in charge of VFX, and again Hiroshi Mukoyama credited for matte
process.
The same FX team worked at Godzilla versus the sea monster (1966) a film with lots of matte
paintings.
For Son
of Godzilla (1967) Tsurubaya used a miniature island on a water tank with a
painted backing.
At Destroy
all monsters (1968) they show the
island as aerial view from a helicopter as
a matte painting. Then it was displayed as a model miniature on a water tank with painted backing. There are many other matte paintings on that film, again
uncredited.
Latitude zero (1969) is also a Toho film, but
without giant monsters. This time is a fantasy science fiction film. Part of
the action happened on a deserted rocky island displayed mostly with matte paintings. Eiji Tsurubaya is again supervisor of FX work
with no matte painting credited.
