The dubbers of Sandy Frank Productions
Jul 24, 2017 17:34:31 GMT -5
TV's Cowboy and bladez636 like this
Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2017 17:34:31 GMT -5
So what was the deal with GUIRON? Did Daei commission a cheap dub for international markets
You've got it.
No one really knew what to think of the Sandy Frank Gamera vs. Guiron until a few years ago when the international version of another 1969 Daiei film, The Falcon Fighters, turned up. The Falcon Fighters was released on video in Greece, and as was often the case with Greek and Eastern Euro releases of Japanese films, it was a transfer of an original English export print prepared by its Japanese distributor. What's unique about TFF, however, is that Daiei credited the English dubbing company!
If you haven't guessed it already, The Falcon Fighters sounds almost exactly like the mysterious "Sandy Frank" Gamera vs. Guiron dub. The "Calamity" actress is here, "Cornjob" is here (more on him later), etc.
However, that doesn't answer where or when Daiei had either TFF or Guiron dubbed.
"Where": We may never definitively know where Pedro Production operated from, but my guess is that it was a Tokyo company. An actor named Pedro Komiyama appeared in two films for Nikkatsu in 1959 and 1960. Because "Pedro" is probably a very uncommon name in Japan, I'm going to assume this is the same Pedro H. Komiyama credited in The Falcon Fighters. Additionally, we know that foreign "actors" living and working in Tokyo during this period moonlighted as voice actors for Frontier Productions, Eikosha Productions, and probably many more forgotten companies. I don't think it's too big a stretch to assume Komiyama might have spoken some English and used some Japanese showbiz connections to start a dubbing firm by the late '60s.
This also possibly narrows down "when," as Komiyama was acting on the screen in '59 and '60, just a decade before either of these films were produced. But, fortunately (?), there are even more late '60s films with probable Pedro Production dubs that suggest this group was active in the '60s and early '70s:
In 1967, Toei produced a television series called "Kamen non ninja Aka-Kage," which is about a trio of magical ninjas that fight all sorts of evildoers in medieval Japan. (Incidentally, some of these villains have giant monsters recycled from 1966's Magic Serpent.) Some time after the show wrapped, Toei turned out at least three English-dubbed films compiled from various episodes. I'm not sure how widely distributed these ersatz features were, but they were issued on DVD in Japan (which has been probably illegally ported over here). No dubbing credit ala The Falcon Fighters, but two of these films feature several of the horrible Pedro Production voice actors, including our pal "Cornjob." A highlight reel of Watari the Conqueror, edited for a Facebook Godzilla group, can be seen here. (Incidentally, the third film, titled Ninjascope, is a classic Ted Thomas Hong Kong dub. Think Gamera vs. Barugon, Gamera vs. Gyaos, Godzilla vs. Megalon, etc.)
It's also been speculated in the aforementioned Godzilla group that the Cornjob "actor" is Mike Daneen, a familiar foreign face in '60s Japanese cinema. Perhaps his biggest role in the fantasy genre was in Toei's Terror Beneath the Sea. He speaks English in the Japanese versions of Gappa (1967) and Toho's Ironfinger (1965) and I think he sounds very much like this Cornjob-dubber in both instances. It also sounds as if he dubbed himself in the horrible international dub for The X From Outer Space (as heard on the Shochiku and Criterion DVD releases), which might imply that that film too was dubbed by Pedro Production.