Rodan

Rodan (1956) is a Japanese science-fiction horror film from Toho, available to watch online on iFILM. Director Ishirō Honda — two years removed from the original Godzilla — brings a prehistoric flying creature out of a coal mine on Kyushu. The creature, a massive pterosaur, hatches underground and works its way to the surface, leaving a trail of dead miners before anyone knows what they're dealing with.

Mining engineer Shigeru is first to piece it together, and what he finds underground is bad enough. The real damage starts when Rodan takes flight: the creature's wingspan generates a shockwave that flattens buildings before it even makes contact. Special effects supervisor Eiji Tsuburaya built the miniature sets of Fukuoka with the same obsessive detail he'd applied to Tokyo in Godzilla — the destruction sequences still hold up. This is kaiju filmmaking at its most methodical, and it laid the groundwork for everything Toho produced in the decade that followed. Stream Rodan online on iFILM.