Review of Matango

The score here is rather high, but this movie to me was kind of low. Low and really slow. It had some good parts to it, do not get me wrong, but it was incredibly slow moving. Most of the mushroom action takes place at the end, before that you get lots of build up and infighting between the characters and it just really made for a somewhat boring film. The story started out good, a group on a yacht are traveling the seas and are hit with a storm, they are adrift for a while and end up near an island. There is virtually no food on the island other than mushrooms, however, the captain's log plainly states you do not want to eat these particular mushrooms called Mantango. Well time passes on the island, tensions build and you just know someone is going to eat a mushroom and then the action begins. Only this does not really happen, the movie seems to want to really show these people passing away time in the island so I am guessing we can understand why they finally broke down, but I wanted to watch a film with a bit more things happening. Like I said, overall I was disappointed with this one, especially considering it was made by Toho studios who make my beloved Godzilla films, but this one just was a bit hard to watch for me personally. The good, the first scenes on the yacht and them finding the island initially. The makeup was good in places too, especially considering the time period. I also liked the ending. Overall, just not a movie for me I am afraid. I would love to have that rifle they used, however, I mean it was not particularly strong, but it never ran out of bullets!