Battle Royale Reviews

Ah, It Takes Me Back...

Battle Royale = The Running Man + Lord of the Flies. In Japan.

Every year a class of schoolkids is chosen at random, landed on an island and told to get on with killing one another until there's only one of them left. Want to team up? Fine, but if at the end of three days there's more than one of you alive you all die by way of a personal exploding collar.

I liked this film. I liked the basic premise, the story, the occasional red fountain, and the interesting non-glitzy way that human relationships are portrayed under one of the most immense (albeit far-fetched) pressures imaginable. On more than one occasion I found my mind stretching back to my schooldays and how I would have dealt with some of my classmates if I'd have found myself in this situation; lucky for a few of them that this is just a movie!

BR has two main flaws. Firstly, much of the action is in the dark, so scenes that were probably perfectly visible in a cinema are just stretches of black with glints of light and a soundtrack when viewed on a TV screen.

Secondly, the film starts off with too many characters. (42 classmates in all.) It's never quite obvious which of them you're supposed to be following, and as a result gets a little bit jumbled. Credit is due to the writer/s for bestowing personalities upon their cannon fodder, but once you've seen one profession and painful rejection of unrequited adolescent love, that's enough to get the gist: After three or four times, what was once sweet quickly becomes cloying.

I haven't read it, but I'd guess that this wealth of characters is a symptom of the film being faithful to the book it is based on. But there simply isn't enough room in a movie like this for so many players.

That said, just go with the flow and it soon straightens out. You'll enjoy BR much more if you don't try to concentrate too hard on where everyone is at any given moment.

Well acted and well shot, ('scuse the pun,) BR is a movie that any fan of Asian cinema should see. However, I don't think there's enough here to coax your average moviegoing subtitle-o-phobe to sit down and concentrate for 109 minutes.

The petition starts here

This is the third time I've watched this film and it won't be the last. The idea of kids having to slaughter one another to teach them respect for adults seems more than a little odd but get past that and you have a film that works on many levels.

Entertaining action, gore, romance ('ish or is it an honourable platonic protector type thing because he promised?), honour, character development - all here in spades.

Now the problem - we have to stop Hollywood from ruining this by a producing a big budget remake staring Tom Cruise and Catherine Zeta Jones. Please sign here...

Hits hard

This film hits you a lot harder than most Hollywood films ever could, this group of youths are told outright that only one of them can live through this ordeal, straight to the point and dosen't worm around any of the details both graphically and emotionally. This film will leave you wondering how you ever missed this genre of horror movies before. Excellent plot and execution of it, and leaves a scary question about human nature itself.

Words fail me

I do not have the vocabulary to express how dreadful this film really is. Don't believe all the positive reviews on here, the authors have been seduced by Jonathan Ross to believe that Japanese film automatically carries a certain cachet and therefore must be a 'good thing'. The premise is unbelievable, the acting is appalling (so much so that it looks deliberate), the effects are non-existent, it looks like it cost about 15 quid to make and the ending bears absolutely no relation to the set up at the start, watch it and you'll see what I mean. It's terrible in every way and boring to boot. I'd recommend complete avoidance personally.

Would you kill your mates to survive?

This film was banned in loads of places. It's really just a slightly less intelligent, but infinitely more gory version of Lord of the Flies.

Japanese school kids are stuck on an island with weapons from pan lids to uzis and its last man standing. Basically some kids take to the killing thing quite happily (there is even one volunteer), some refuse to be a part of it, some go it alone and some form teams.

One noce bit is the cutsie instruction video which tells them the rules.

Watch out if you get the pan lid and I get the uzi....

Fantastic Film!

Don't let the idea of a film with sub titles make you miss out on one of the best films to come out of Japan in recent years. If you want to see world cinema at its best and possibly most disturbing you really should see this film.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Drivel

Apparently meaningful, utterly ridiculous nonsense. I'm glad they got killed. Orwell/Salinger/Golding for idiots. Don't bother unless you're a 6th form goth/emo with the brain of a pixie

This upset people... you'll see why

This movie was a little near the knuckle in the wake of Columbine and was briefly refused a release in the West. Bearing in mind its subject matter: school children are drugged and then taken to a remote island, handed weapons (of varying effectiveness) and told that only the last one standing gets to leave.

In addition they are wired with the classic 'explosive dog collars' and the tension grows from there. The friend I watched it with made the comment that it would have been less disturbing if the kids had been less well characterised but the core cast have very layered characters who force you, despite the absurdity of the situation, to care for them.

In a way that seals the deal. Battle Royale isn't merely a one-joke black comedy for the kind of person who thinks Peter Jackson's Bad Taste is equitable with Citizen Kane. It forces you, despite yourself, to think about violence in a new light.

It is good to know in a world where it is common practice for movie lovers to be fairly jaded towards violent content to be made to sit up and take notice. These kids DON'T WANT to kill each other (well, most of them) they just want to get by, they want to be alive. Violence here is about survival but the situation is engineered.

This kicks back and makes the villain into a god-like figure. 'Beat' Takeshi brings gravitas and whimsy in delicate balance to his psychopathic, fatherly 'referee'. You can see how at the same time he is repulsive to the children (obviously) he also fills them with awe and makes them seek his favour.

It is true that the film will disturb you, there is no way to get around that. But it is pretty much essential viewing for anyone who has an opinion of any sort about violence in the media and in society.

This one will start and has started a lot of rows.

Excellent Film

A very interesting concept. A class of children are chosen at random by the government and are taken to a remote island where they have to kill each other...The winner is the one left alive.

Yet again, the Japanese show the West how to make a quality film. I'm sure that there will be an inferior Hollywood version out eventually, however, don't be put off by subtitles. This is a quality film, I recommend that you rent it!!!

Disappointed

Rather disappointed with this, it all just seemed rather silly. There never really seemed to be a great deal of tension at any point during the film, which I kind of expected from an action film