Battle Royale Review
I have to admit that I am not a real fan of horror or gore movies. I would rather watch a film about a man in tights saving the world than someone tortured to death. That said, I believe there is a place for violence in cinema as long as it supports the story and is not just there to make a quick buck with a few easy shocks. Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction and Fight Club are some examples of ultraviolence done right, but if there is one film that constantly lures me back with morbid fascination, its the Japanese cult hit Battle Royale.
Look at that cheerful red and black logo, Im expecting only bunnies and happy things from here on…
Firstly let me make on thing clear, this is not a movie for children or tweenages trying to fill their need for more Hunger Games content. Although lots of people will mention the two franchises in the same sentence, Battle Royale is on a whole different level of black satire. It is filled with blood and death and trauma. Where as The Hunger Games kept its soul numbing depictions of child combat to a diluted second half of the movie, Battle Royale stretches its sickening tension for its entire running time. The atmosphere is dark and grim throughout, with the lower budget ‘fuzz’ of a Japanese movie constantly keeping things closer to reality then we would like. It is not one for the faint of heart, what I would refer to as midnight movie. (There is even a story that it was banned in the USA, although this is not technically true, it was more a case of no-one with the money for the licence wanting to stock it). But as with other controversial movies such as A Clock Work Orange, those who can stomach it will find and engaging, thought provoking story lies benieth its dark shell.
Woah, not that horrifying and controversial …
The film is based on the exploitation novel by Koushun Takami, who wrote the story as response to the Japanese governments treatment of their youth during the war, often forcing them into situations that would cost them their lives. Takami’s novel is set in the near future, where a totalitarian government rules Japan and most of Asia. As with all totalitarian dystopia Japan has a the constant problem of a population on the brink of uprising, especially amongst it younger generation who are becoming increasingly unruly and rebellious. In order to keep the order the Battle Royale act is passed, meaning that each year one class of 15-16 year olds is selected at random and taken to a secret location where they are fitted with explosive necklaces and forced to fight to the death over 3 days. The sole survivor is allowed to return home. It is centred around the 42 students of class 3-B, each with his or own chapter and story arc, but focuses mainly on the three antagonists; Shuya, Noriko and Kawada, all of whom are determined not to be dragged into the game.
‘Now don’t worry, Michael Bay assures me all the pyrotechnic stuff we crammed inside them will look great on camera… ACTION!’
For the most part the film adaptation does it best to copy this structure, with most students getting their own scenes, some of which are much more well developed then others. As with all book to film conversations a lot of the content is lost in transit and if you really want the full story of each of the 42 characters you ideally need to read the manga. Maybe if the remake ever comes, and I sort of hope it wont, then a trilogy with a movie for each day would be a more effective way of covering everything. Despite this, enough is retained to keep the movie constantly interesting, and its mass of characters and short stories that make it so engaging.
Looks like the sort of girl you could take home to meet your mother.
As a single movie with so much content stuffed into two hours, the pacing is surprising well done, with enough action to keep everything following nicely. Also for a large cast of young actors, most of whom were the same age as their characters, the acting is also surprisingly consistent. The director Kinji Fukasaku is well known for pushing his employees hard, are method which obviously works as most put in a pretty good performance. I could certainly feel the panic and fear a lot more then I could in The Hunger Games. The person who stood out to me the most was Takeshi Kitano, (an ex-comedian oddly) as the miserably evil teacher/overseer, who does a great job of looking both tired and psychotic at the same time. Also good was Tarô Yamamoto, playing the game veteran Kawada, who looks like we would be more at home in an 80′s action movie and gives a spark of old school ‘Die Hard’ heroism to the otherwise dark proceedings.
In the special edition he claims he is too old for this sh*t then boots Hans Gruber out of a window.
Although still an excellent film, Battle Royale does have a few problems. As I mentioned before the amount of attention each character gets is pretty impressive given the running time, although occasional it does feel as though other bits of the story have been sacrificed in order to make everything fit. Certain key plot points relating to necklaces seem to be missing from the last few scenes, as if the writer could not think of a proper way to explain the situation so just skipped over it. We get the general idea of what happened, but it seems an odd piece of the story to skip, given the importance which is placed on it earlier. The other main problem is that the ending suffers from a rather bizzare moment with Takeshi Kitano. If you have already seen the film then you will know want I am talking about. This could be some cultural thing I do not understand, but judging by the expressions on the faces of the other characters I am not convinced. Its such a strange moment and the way comes out of nowhere just destroys the tension in the final moments.
‘… I just wanted you to next the tv listings, see if there’s anything worth me hanging on for… Battle Royale 2? Screw that.’ *dies*
The final thing I have to note about Battle Royale that it will always be best the first time around. The key to this movie is the shock value, which is what makes the atmosphere work so well. Once you know what to expect you are still left with an entertaining movie, but it does feel as though it loses something. In some ways repeated viewing is advisable as you are likely to miss things the first time, but it just does not work quite as well.
Battle Royale is a cult classic for a reason, it is terrific and terrifying but certainly not for everyone. Most people will not get past the basic concept and without feeling decidedly uncomfortable. But that is exactly what the movie is made to do. Discomfort makes fear, fear makes tension and tension makes a thrilling piece of cinema. Sometimes the most memorable movie experiences are the ones that make us remember them, and if you watch Battle Royale you will not be forgetting it any time soon. A must watch for fans of Japanese entertainment or cult cinema followers, assuming you have the steel stomach required and a nice Disney flick to wash the taste out after.
Because there’s nothing dark or disturbing in any of their films.
The Hunger Games: Review
It is probably late to give my thoughts on this movie. I went to see it last Tuesday and by now most people who are interested will have either seen it already or read so many other reviews they are sick of hearing about it. Anyway this is just a brief summary of my thoughts and I will try to keep it as spoiler-free as possible.
Not a Seagull or a Moltres apparently.
First of all I am just going to come out and say it; this movie bares a close reassembles to the Japanese movie Battle Royale, by which I mean it is within law-suit throwing distance. Should you care? No, you should not. Both are brilliant films, but I do feel the similarities are just too big to ignore. For those not familiar Battle Royale is about a class of kids sent to island ordered to reduce their numbers to one for the pleasure of a national audience. Its based on a novel by Koushun Takami who wrote it is a satire against the Japanese Government, following his experiences of horror and death a child in World War 2. Now the idea of the death sport is not a new one, nor is the idea of the child survivalist. Stories such as Lord of the Flies, The Running Man, 1984 and even Gladiator have all had a similar premise, so trying to suggest that one is a ‘rip-off’ of the other is a redundant argument.
Pictured above: A redundant argument
However, ideas such as the romance between the male and female protagonists, the gruth lone survivor of the previous games helping them out, the two ‘volunteers’ who are in it for their own gain and even the nightly announcements listing the dead are all suspiciously similar. Were these similarities deliberately included in The Hunger Games by the original author? Its extremely unlikely. Where existing similarities enhanced by Hollywood as a way to cash in on both franchises? Much more likely, especially considering their eagerness for a so far unsuccessful American remake of Battle Royale. In America the Battle Royale movies have were very recently removed from the banned list and given proper releases, whilst in the UK we got the enhanced Blu-ray and up-coming 3D version. Now has to be more then a coincidence.
Judging by its terrified, lifeless eyes that doll has obviously watched Battle Royale 2 and torn off its own head out of sheer boredom.
I did have a few more points to make on this subject, but I will save that death match for another day. Lets talk about The Hunger Games. Its good. I am not a screaming fan-girl so I will not try and convince you this is the ultimate movie, because it isn’t. But for every flaw there at least two positives, something strangely unusual for a movie with this much hype.
As discussed the general storyline was been seen before. In a post-apocalyptic world, a group of children consisting of a boy and a girl from each of 12 districts, is picked at random to battle to the death in front of a live audience. If watching youngsters murdering each to other to death makes you feel a bit uneasy then do not touch this film (and avoid Battle Royale like it carries the zombie-plague). In the UK it carried a 12A rating, something me and others felt was shockingly under-rated and doubling annoying as most of the film had to be cut in order to get below a 15 certificate. If you come stomach the violence (either because you are over 15 or a psychopathic) then the rest of the story is rich with satire, especially the first half which takes numerous swipes at our increasingly media based society. For me this was my favourite part of the film. The children going to their deaths are made into talent show-esqe celebrities and forced to play up these roles in order to win the favour of their wealthy ‘sponsors’, who often mean the difference between life and death. It also tries to make a point about the desensitising effect of the violence in said media, a point I felt was drowned in a wave of irony.
A young Lily Savage introduces tonight’s next hopeful before impaling them on a big spike.
The setting was stylish, although sometimes familiar, the rich capital city contrasting well against the poorer districts with its Roman/Greek style designs and grotesquely bejewled citizens. It reminded me of some of the old 80′s sci-fi movies like The Fifth Element and The Running Man and I have a feeling this was done intentionally. There are some sci-fi elements in this movie, such as an awesome hover train, but these are brief and do not distract from the plot. A pre-game talk show the contestants (all of who are great young actors) participate in is both funny and creepy, whilst the way in which the heroine and her love interested are deliberately forced together for the sake of ratings was a rather refreshing after most other stale movie romances.
‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky… *awesome air guitar solo*
The second half of the movie is the game itself and in my opinion is not as enjoyable as the first act. Rather then a flowing plot, it feels more like a set of events breaking up the occasional next step in story. Unlike in Battle Royale (sorry to keep bring it back up) where most of the constants are given their own little side-stories, here all the focus is on the main lead and I could not help but feel that when see was sitting in a tree we were missing out on the action elsewhere. On that subject, one of the bizzare things I noticed was the way in which the violence was covered up during this second half. This may have just been because I was watching the 12A edited version (hopefully there will be an uncut dvd) but a lot of the time the camera would pan away from a death scene or disguise it with the dreaded ‘shaky’ effect. I find it odd that a movie which features children as young as 12 killing each other, including being stung to death by wasps and torn apart by mutant dogs (who had no real business being in this movie anyway) should suddenly shy away from its subject matter like this, almost as if the director had lost his nerve during the final stretch.
Not Pictured: Disturbing violence. Pictured: Man with disturbing blue hair.
At about the 3/4 mark I have to admit I was starting to wish the conclusion would hurry up and arrive, and when it did I found it was pretty much exactly what I was expecting. I will not go into the details, but it is not a hard one to predict. The ending is left open for the obviously forthcoming sequels, which my friend (who has actually read the books) assures me they will be very different in terms of story and is already hyped up to see them. Although I have never read the books, I probably will be seeing them too. The Hunger Games whilst not being the greatest thing ever put on screen did at least show that people behind it cared about what they were making and put a lot of effort into it. There are plot holes and themes that are not fully developed (‘I don’t want to kill’ ‘Its just like hunting’ ‘Oh okay.’ FWAPPP) but despite this the overall experience is gripping and well worth seeing at least once, even if like me you never knew The Hunger Games existed until now. If you did, chances are you have already seen it and this review has been completely irrelevant.
Also…Weren’t you bright blue and a bit scaly last time I saw you…?
The Hunger Games: Pre-Review
For a while now I have wanted to write a review of something and as The Hunger Games seems to be the internets new addiction (after cats and gynecology), I figured I would add my own opinions to the mix. To ensure this is done in a fair and unbiased way, I am writing this review before I see the movie (or read the book or buy the lunch box), as I feel doing so would directly influence my judgement of it.
To start with the movie clearly has nothing to do with Sherlock Holmes, which I found to be an odd and alienating decision on the part of the writers. Instead the plot focuses mainly on a group of teenagers sitting, occasionally walking, in wood which could very well be revealed as a forest later sequels. I personally find this a welcome continuation of pace for the whole teenagers standing around in woodland genre, however the death-sport sub-plot was somewhat distracting and I could not help but feel the film would have benefited from its removal. Fortunately the director wisely decided to downplay this entire aspect by removing all the death scenes/references and replaced them with a CGI talking Ford Fiesta in a similar way to Pixars later rewrite of Cars 2: Murder Wheels.
The cast do a brilliant job of bringing the story of murder and trees to life, the most notable of which is a CGI talking Micheal Keaton; who can been seen in the films trailer playing that mother from Brazil, ruler of District 12 (*Insert District 9 alien joke*) and commander of an army of Space Balls. The hawk who stars in the logo however is less impressive, apparently unable to decide if its head is looking straight ahead in profile, or forward in a sort of down and right-a-bit angle. Those who will also be unimpressed are the fans of the book, to which this film is entirely unrelated after birzarry substituting text for moving pictures as a means of conveying the plot.
Overall I would highly recommend this film, although I must point out the cinema will charge extra for bringing in outside Battle Royale jokes.
I have no idea what point this image was made to represent, but I’m sure its relevant to whatever.
For a more ‘traditional’ less ‘dangerously radical thinker’ (as my food teacher would describe) type review, stay tuned until after Tuesday when I see The Hunger Games for-reals.
