ANI-MOVIES, *The Little Prince And The Eight-Headed Dragon

Columbia Pictures was really getting experimental with its release back in the day of the 1963 animated movie, The Little Prince And The Eight-Headed Dragon that was created by Toei Animation which back then was called Toei Doga. The color film was done in anamorphic widescreen format which works in its favor as there are several sprawling shots of flying fantasy and fiery fights. The story is inspired by the legend of Susanoo who was the Shinto equivalent of Thor but as a child. Yasuji Mori was one of the animation directors on this film who had previously worked on Toei Daga's Tale Of The White Serpent, and his style went on to have a huge effect on future artists like Genndy Tartakovsky and Tomm Moore. In fact, the design for this movie helped shape the style of The Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker video game. Another big contributor to the film was the music by Akira Ifukube who is famous for creating the scores for the original Godzilla movies. The movie achieved a moderate success among other 60s anime productions dubbed into English at the time like Magic Boy and Alakazam The Great, even though it only recently got a Blu-ray release in both Japan and America featuring the original 60s dub.

Susanoo's story is he is the son of a pair of gods that fished out the islands from the ocean that eventually became the nation of Japan. His mother, the creation goddess Izanami, passes away off screen somehow, and Susanoo's father tells him to just get over it. The super-strong godling instead throws a big tantrum and wrecks half of the city. He builds a boat of his own to find his mother in the afterlife since his father forbids from giving him a vessel to travel in. Susanoo travels with his rabbit buddy Akahana and first fights a giant fish who the King of the Sea thanks by sending him to the realm of his brother, The Crystal Prince. The Little Prince is given a special elemental stone that comes in handy when he battles the temperamental God of Fire who can replicate himself which makes for an awesome spectacle. Our hero then gets another tagalong with the large Titanbo from the God of Fire's former country to look for a new land for his people. Susanoo continues to his sister, The Sun Goddess, who becomes so embarrassed by her younger brother's shenanigans that she seals herself up in a mountain and her followers spend several minutes trying to coax her from coming out, so they don't freeze to death in the darkness. After the Sub Goddess finally comes out of her hole, she banishes her brother to search for his mother. Susanoo meets a girl known only as the Little Princess who is the next to be sacrificed to an Orochi here referred to as the Eight-Headed Dragon. The Little Prince pledges to save the Little Princess by confronting the dragon after he gains the help of a flying horse which helps him finally slay the multi-headed kaiju. Susanoo then decides to stay in this newly reborn land and help the Little Princess rebuild her people's kingdom along with making it a home for the Fire refugees.

Despite the fact that this movie helped influence several future animators, you can tell that the film itself borrowed heavily from Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty, especially in the duel against Maleficent as a dragon. The dubbing is very forgettable and doesn't fit the lip flaps at all, but altogether not the worse that made for a 60s anime dub. The movie is now finally on streaming and officially free on YouTube, so be sure to give it a look.