Now this is a great story. I hope that people can get past there laziness to not read subtitles and watch a great story unfold on film. With a very believable cast and good direction. this is a must see especially for Manga fans.
Bloody as all get out but I'd be lying if I didn't say that I enjoyed the movie a lot. It was a simple plot line and the entire situation was so surreal that it was interesting. It's a movie that I would see again.
A true cult classic! Wonderfully dark premise, well told. Consistantly good performances all around, exciting and intense, with some good dialogue. Ultraviolent and morally challenging. You can't watch this without thinking 'what would I do?'. And I'm sure everyone can watch these characters and think of someone they went to school with who was just like that! Really fun stuff!!
Weird, and the subtitles started to get worse and worse as the movie went on. I know you lose something in stranslation, but surely Japanese know the difference between baseball and basketball!
Habia oido hablar de ella, decian que era buena pero necesitaba comprobarlo por mi mismo ... ¡a mi me encantó! Pero bien es cierto de que no le va a gustar a todo el mundo... a los fans del manga y anime es muy probable que les guste y mucho, pues tiene una estética muy en ese estilo (absurdeces, clichés... incluidos también) ... ¿Al resto? Bueno, la verdad es que la mayoria van a ser opiniones un tanto antagónicas: O es una maravilla o un bodrio. En fin, juzguen ustedes mismos ;) (Eso sí, la actuación del gran Beat Takeshi es magnifica, en eso no hay mucho que discutir...)
I really like this film, it's original, violent and very watchable. Sure, you can argue that school children need a little more discipline, but loading them all up on a coach and forcing them to kill each other? Anyway, it's a decent film on youth re...(read more)bellion, and the state's attempts to control them on a somewhat drastic scale.
BR's jet black perspective on the state of contemporary schools is not so far from the truth. Japan's in-movie 'solution' is horrifying and possibly close to the truth.
Great film. the Premise for it made it really intresting and at times sad and at other times funny. A lot more in deepth than it may apear at first. Love the end scene with the cookies.
Sheer amazement. Even though the plot sounds very dumb and silly, the film is actually much deeper than it may appear. I belive that this is one film all teens should see before they finish school.
The premise is thin but the first of these at least has well written and acted characters. Not for those who might not "enjoy" numerous inventive deaths.
Greatest movie ever to come out of Japan! Wit a plot of high school kids forced to kill eachother on an island because of a government law is bound to please a movie buff. Highly recommended!
Man, this is one brutal film!!! don't think Iv'e seen one like this...ever. just the whole premise of the film would get it protested and eventually banned from US theatres: In the future, due to kids being, well...kids, groups of them are chosen to go to a remote island where they must kill each other until one remains. Brutally violent from beginning to end, this one will have you thinking about it for a long long time after you see it. Not for the squeamish.
Films usually find there audience on DVD, usually you only hear films becoming 'cult classics' if they get poor box office results (eg. The Boondock Saints), this one is an exception, it was one of the top 10 grossing Japanese films of all time and even managed to become a 'cult classic' and I certainly respect it for that, but I ended up being a little disappointed with this film but can't deny it is above average, but I guess I just wasn't the final audience at the end of the day.
The main thing I expected this film to be was provocative and gory as hell, I do keep an open mind before viewing films just in case but I had just heard alot about the film and wasn't satisified enough with the gore, nor was it as provocative as I had wanted it to be. The premise is very intriguing and it is disturbing how the adults act in this film, but I just found that the plot wasn't exactly original or something shocking, especially when chaos, violence and a world of rebellious teenagers is basically society today.
But aside from that, I found the themes covered to be done very well ('Could you kill your best friend?") and I was reasonably entertained, but I guess I wanted more from the film, seeing as I heard so much more....I guess I just wasn't part of that cult classic audience.
This is such a difficult film to review. Where is the line drawn between art and exploitation? Yes, Battle Royale has satiric elements, though they are scattered carelessly and seem to have little correspondence with the real world. Yes, it is artistically directed/scored/acted and skillfully edited, but the fact remains that this is a film about 52 10th grade students brutally killing eachother on an island until only one remains. A premise can hardly get more exploitive than that.
And yet, I find myself on the other side of the fence for one simple reason: respect. No matter how tense, exciting or suspenseful the film may get, it always respects the children, every single one of them. All of them are portrayed as individuals, all of them have personalities of their own, all of them handle the situation differently (some commit suicide, others band together to find a solution, others cease to function completely) and, tellingly, when each student dies text appears on the screen with their full name. This last bit may not sound like much, but in an era of mindless violence to faceless masses, to consider the victims as named individuals is a mark of empathy.
As it stands, Battle Royale is a masterpiece....of what, exactly? I'm not sure, but it is definitely worth seeing if you have the stomach for it. Tense, exciting, moving, and surprisingly funny at times. A work of art.
I was not impressed with this movie. The death at the end was so fake and unrealistic it made me question what was going on in the script writers head at the time.
?So today's lesson is... you kill each other off 'til there's only one left. Nothing's against the rules.?
The best thing about this ultra violent film is that after watching it either alone or with a group of friends the inevitable question that will be asked is what would you do? Battle Royale is also not the simple splatter-fest and apparent violence inducing teenage fantasy the Daily Mail would have you believe, there is nothing fun about the situation the class of 42 find themselves in it?s Lord of the Flies (that?s fine) except if you have a torch and someone else has a machine gun you know your probably going to die. Yet if you did happen to be the one lacking a torch and gaining the gun you may have the upper hand but the problem now is what do you choose to do with it? The moral implications and questions in Battle Royale are agonising. The film is also clever enough to show how this particular society has come to this method of dealing with its delinquent youth and why it has been accepted, the glimpses of school life are enough also to show why the teacher (legendary Beat Takeshi) is so weary with his class. At times the film is uncomfortable but it moves at such a searing pace that flits between violence, humour and melancholy that it will stick in your head for days after.
This movie rocks! Against their will, a class of students are taken to an island were they are told to kill each other off within 72 hours. The only catch is each student has weaponry ranging from slug guns to a pot lid. As usual the government is the main enemy but human nature also has a big part to play in this film. Kinji Fukasaku is the king of the multiple subplot.
A mindwarping flick that will stick to me for a longgg time...This is one of the few movies that got my mind thinking hard on things...The characters personalities are so well touched and demonstrated i have no idea how Kinji Fukasaku came up with such a concept...Brilliant!
MCT:November 8, 2007
MCT:November 7, 2007
MCT:November 6, 2007
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MCT:October 27, 2007
