Battle Royale - And You Thought Seppuku Was Bad

In one of Donald Glover's comedy sets, he asks why we have the stereotype that all Japanese people are weird or crazy. He answers his own question: 'Because we dropped a RADIOACTIVE BOMB on them! If you filled me with radioactivity then got me to design a mall, that mall would be fucked up!' I feel that this film is a logical progression from this gag - it's seriously 'fucked up' plotwise, but it's a strong genre piece that is apparently quite a good leaping pad for those trying to get into the extensive work of Kinji Fukasaku.

Essentially, it's like the Hunger Games except less overtly political with the whole 'districts' spiel and a lot more explicitly violent. A class of Japanese school children are nominated by a former teach to partake in the annual Battle Royale, in which the kiddies must fight to the death over the space of 3 days on an abandoned island observed by a number of soldiers and game supervisors in a high-tech control room. They each get some food and water and a random bit of kit that could be useful e.g. a crossbow or entirely 'the joke's on you' e.g. a saucepan lid. Some mysterious guests with mysterious agendas are also thrown in the mix, so the sole survivor will really have to work for their life. Friendships get tested as do survival instincts and adaptive abilities. There's only one certainty - when the Japanese spill blood, they aren't afraid to make it gloriously unsubtle, or the blood of a frighteningly young citizen.

While not explicitly a horror film (I'll pay thriller), it's certainly a genre piece, and on this credential (along with Tarantino's wholehearted recommendation) I felt that it warranted a peek. The premise of its strong source material - Koushun Takami's 1999 novel - is its greatest strength. It's wacky, but there is a lot of exploration enabled in the relationships on-screen and in the audience's expectations of human behaviour being twisted in the sick combat we witness. The director's son Kenta adapted this film, and he's done a great job. There appear to be some leaps in logic as to how exactly the absurd program came about from within the government and how it can possibly be perpetuated, but once you're in the actual game there is really no time available to sit back and question. With 44 competitors (42 school kids, 2 of the aforementioned mystery guests) starting out on the island, there is going to have to be a lot of dispatching shown to whittle down the possibilities. And this dispatching is split into two fairly distinct subgroups - touching, slow, character deaths and indiscriminate, swift, murder enacted on background players. I could muster no real complaints in how these are distributed - enough of each to satisfy both the blood-lust that we all deny we have and the innate desire for human connection.

The cast is the second strongest aspect of this film. Working with children is renowned for the difficulty that comes with wrangling the youngsters, but Fukasaku overcomes this adage by allowing their rawness to shine through. They are kids, and they react as such. They weep very openly. They have their little circles of friends. They chuck a wet one when there's a hint of betrayal within said circles. While some characters definitely blur into each other (there are just so many running around), you do ultimately care for them, and when they go on their merry way to Hell you feel pretty down. In this manner it's closest to a horror - calling the stuff we're privy to in this flick horrific would be like calling a Wednesday night at college a little rowdy... a grade-A understatement. It hurts. Pretty badly if I'm honest. But that doesn't detract from the experience - it's kinda the whole cruxof the film-maker's statements about the state of the youth and the helplessness of society when it comes to providing structures to help them. The older members of the cast - particularly Kateshi Kitano as their phenomenally barless class teacher - do hold up their end of the bargain, though noticeably fade into the background.

I had some troubles with the photography, which never quite nails it in the night set pieces. It gets a kind of overwhelming blue wash which just messes with your appreciation of the action as much of it gets swallowed in this kind of inky blackness that creeps in around the subjects framed in a distinctly dark blue tone. The editing and score do their respective bits well, though aren't particularly memorable. While the blood is liberally strewn across this film, there is some room for improvement in terms of realism - although perhaps it's simply part of Japanese cinema culture that a certain lack of reality when dealing with the blood of grade 3 kids is a good thing for both the audience and the ratings boards.

Now, Bevan from Paul's and Albert von Hammerschmidt OBE will purvey their respective takes on the modern Japanese classic.

Bevan from Paul's input:

Pubescent homicide... A movie about mortal combat between a group of 48 teenagers sounds and is awesome; for there is no other demographic that is as unstable and psychopathic than the 14-15 aged girl- and they don't disappoint. No west-written script (the hunger games) could have possessed the unique ability to make a film such as this; contrasting the vulnerability and innocence of these pimply half-men and women with cruelties inherent the modern world with the touch of the writer Koushun Takami and director Kinji Fukasaku. That said, the dialogue in the subtitles deserved a more considered treatment for there was, how do you say it, something "Rost in transration". Don't go and see The Hunger Games, watch this. Out.

Albert von Hammerschmidt OBE's input:

The best way to sum up Battle Royale would be if Home and Away was set in Japan and between the romantic love interests the characters killed each other. Tis a crazy, crazy ride, where you aren't sure what is happening 100% of the time due to questionable translation of the subtitles and an insane culture gap. That aside it’s a definite recommendation, so much so that it inspired me to set up my own battle royale on one of my islands in Micronesia. The kills and gore in this film are very imaginative, with winks to this film being found in works such as Tarantino. 4.5 sobbing Japanese schoolgirls (literally) out of 5.

So, this is a strong genre piece. It's what I wanted from The Hunger Games but never got - a darkly comic, highly involving, bloody thrill ride with lashings of political commentary. It's earnt a respectable 34 out of 42 Japanese youths, and it's certainly ignited a desire in me to look further into some renowned J-horror movies a la Ringu.