Half Human (also known as Beastman Snowman in Japan) is a 1955 Kaiju film by Toho Co. LTD. directed by Ishirō Honda, produced by Tomoyuki Tanaka, written by Takeo Murata and effects supervised by Eiji Tsuburaya.
The plot is told from the perspective of flashbacks by a mountaineering club from Towa university, who return from the Japanese alps wounded and traumatized. As they are being interviewed by a reporter, they recall their experience. They went up to the Japanese alps go skiing, and during their trip they encounter a strange, unknown village and the inhuman creature they worship.
Half Human is notable for being the first original Kaiju film made by Toho after Godzilla Raids Again, something would continue throughout the late 50’s to the 70’s. It’s also notable for being banned by Toho themselves because of the movie's villagers called the "buraku", which are associated with Japan’s Burakumin minority group. Since offensive depictions of Burakumin were considered a sensitive topic after its theatrical run, it never saw any sort of home video release afterwords, not even in the DVD, Blu-ray and HD digital age (A VHS release was in the works in the Mid 90’s, but was ultimately cancelled before anything came of it). Interestingly enough, the workprint used for the unused VHS release was later used for the current bootleg releases. Even more interesting is that, while the film itself is hard to find, the original soundtrack composed by Masaru Sato has been released and even remastered as recent as 2016.
The film was also released in America which, in tradition to other Toho movies of its time, cuts out some scenes and includes new ones with American actors in a similar vein to Godzilla: King of the Monsters! (1956). Most notably it features legendary character actor John Carradine as a doctor who also serves as the movies narrator. Unlike its Japanese counterpart, the American cut has been released on VHS twice, though even it wasn’t released DVD or Blu-ray either.
This film contains examples of:
- Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: The titular monster is a snow yeti.
- Bittersweet Ending: The hikers manage to make it back home, but one of their friends was killed by the snowman, plus said snowman, his son, and the native woman Chika are dead.
- Laser-Guided Karma: The snowman is abducted by poachers, who murder his son when the child tries to free his father. The person responsible is hurled off a cliff by the snowman in the aftermath.
- Last of His Kind: The snowman and his child are, as far as any evidence goes, the last survivors of their species. The snowman abducts Machiko after his son is killed, solely because there are no females of his kind left and he desperately wants another child. Ultimately, he too is killed, and the snowmen are left extinct.
- Mars Needs Women: The yeti abducts a female researcher after his son is killed. The English-language version glosses over it, but the Japanese version makes it explicit that his goal is to have another child - whether she wants to or not.
- Whole Episode Flashback: Both versions are told this way, but the framing device is different - in the Japanese version, the survivors tell their story to a reporter; in the English version, John Carradine's character recites the story to his fellow scientists.
