Battle Royale 2
Aug. 10th, 2006 01:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tallulahgsSo... Youtube once again granted my wishes (all hail the great god Youtube *cough*) and I found a subbed version of Battle Royale 2.
So. Um. Well.
Had so many things that could have been great... but overall... I wasn't that impressed. Like, Shiori Kitano? Good. Shuuya? Good. Juvenile delinquents? Good. Partnering system? Interesting. You know? But as it was, it just kind of all stuck together in this big massive sticky ball of WTF-ery.
The teacher this time reminded me of the sadistic dentist from Little Shop of Horrors. Which was... interesting.
The first time a collar exploded, it was really powerful and I felt really bad for the girl, and also I thought it was interesting morally, because now you can't say 'I won't play' without dooming someone else. But then after about five kids had gone up like firecrackers, it got a little... samey.
And what the hell is with the random US-bashing? Look, I am not an America fangirl, but all this sudden 'BLAME THE US IT IS THEIR FAULT THIS IS HAPPENING WE WILL KILL THEM WITH FIRE' crap... dudes, YOU are the ones who strap explosives to teenagers and/or blow up buildings. Y'know? Take responsibility for your own actions.
Speaking of actions and buildings: Shuuya, love, listen. (1) YOU ARE EIGHTEEN. IN THIS COUNTRY, YOU ARE AN ADULT. Declaring war against all adults has a slight flaw in it and also makes me think of Peter Pan. (2) You blew up at least one kid. You therefore have like no leg to stand on when it comes to morality. (3) 'You must stop blowing up kids with explosive collars. I will make you stop by blowing up kids with bombs.' Logic go, well, boom.
See, now if the movie had kind of made it more obvious that Shuuya had gone nuts, I would've understood. As it was... I just felt it didn't really have any moral point or centre. It was just people blowing each other up.
What else? I do think the second half dragged a bit. Possibly getting rid of the game structure was a mistake, I don't know.
The cast all did their best with some rather dodgy material. Props especially to... Tatsuya Fujiwara, is it? Shuuya. For making this seem actually convincing at times.
So yeah. I'm glad I've seen it, but I'm not bursting to see it again.
I guess I can see that the director was perhaps wanting to put us into the mind of a terrorist. And I am not that fond of war movies, so was probably biased. And it sounds like the special edition did rectify some of the mistakes of the movie by having more character interaction and allowing us to get to know more of the kids. BUT. I agree with someone on the BR film forum that having Shuuya blowing up the towers at the beginning was possibly not such a good idea. Had Shuuya been seen trying to assassinate the president, or making an attack on the military, I think that would have reduced the 'Shuuya=terrorist WTF?'-ness and solved a lot of the morality issues. I personally just found it hard to root for Shuuya when I knew he'd killed innocent civilians, especially children, considering what his cause is! I think if the Fukasakus had wanted to make a movie about that sort of terrorist, they shouldn't have begun with the BR universe, because I can't deal with Shuuya's child-killing ways when he's supposed to be angry about a government that kills children. As it was, I found his lack of logic really infuriating.
And I still think the anti-American sentiment was stupid, again because it was in a movie about BR. What exactly do the Americans have to do with the original BR Act, which kick-started all of this? It's seeing Japan at its worst, as a nationalistic, xenophobic, blind country. Saying 'I hate America LOL' isn't brave or cutting-edge - lots of people are doing it, and at least they can come up with reasons.
So. Um. Well.
Had so many things that could have been great... but overall... I wasn't that impressed. Like, Shiori Kitano? Good. Shuuya? Good. Juvenile delinquents? Good. Partnering system? Interesting. You know? But as it was, it just kind of all stuck together in this big massive sticky ball of WTF-ery.
The teacher this time reminded me of the sadistic dentist from Little Shop of Horrors. Which was... interesting.
The first time a collar exploded, it was really powerful and I felt really bad for the girl, and also I thought it was interesting morally, because now you can't say 'I won't play' without dooming someone else. But then after about five kids had gone up like firecrackers, it got a little... samey.
And what the hell is with the random US-bashing? Look, I am not an America fangirl, but all this sudden 'BLAME THE US IT IS THEIR FAULT THIS IS HAPPENING WE WILL KILL THEM WITH FIRE' crap... dudes, YOU are the ones who strap explosives to teenagers and/or blow up buildings. Y'know? Take responsibility for your own actions.
Speaking of actions and buildings: Shuuya, love, listen. (1) YOU ARE EIGHTEEN. IN THIS COUNTRY, YOU ARE AN ADULT. Declaring war against all adults has a slight flaw in it and also makes me think of Peter Pan. (2) You blew up at least one kid. You therefore have like no leg to stand on when it comes to morality. (3) 'You must stop blowing up kids with explosive collars. I will make you stop by blowing up kids with bombs.' Logic go, well, boom.
See, now if the movie had kind of made it more obvious that Shuuya had gone nuts, I would've understood. As it was... I just felt it didn't really have any moral point or centre. It was just people blowing each other up.
What else? I do think the second half dragged a bit. Possibly getting rid of the game structure was a mistake, I don't know.
The cast all did their best with some rather dodgy material. Props especially to... Tatsuya Fujiwara, is it? Shuuya. For making this seem actually convincing at times.
So yeah. I'm glad I've seen it, but I'm not bursting to see it again.
I guess I can see that the director was perhaps wanting to put us into the mind of a terrorist. And I am not that fond of war movies, so was probably biased. And it sounds like the special edition did rectify some of the mistakes of the movie by having more character interaction and allowing us to get to know more of the kids. BUT. I agree with someone on the BR film forum that having Shuuya blowing up the towers at the beginning was possibly not such a good idea. Had Shuuya been seen trying to assassinate the president, or making an attack on the military, I think that would have reduced the 'Shuuya=terrorist WTF?'-ness and solved a lot of the morality issues. I personally just found it hard to root for Shuuya when I knew he'd killed innocent civilians, especially children, considering what his cause is! I think if the Fukasakus had wanted to make a movie about that sort of terrorist, they shouldn't have begun with the BR universe, because I can't deal with Shuuya's child-killing ways when he's supposed to be angry about a government that kills children. As it was, I found his lack of logic really infuriating.
And I still think the anti-American sentiment was stupid, again because it was in a movie about BR. What exactly do the Americans have to do with the original BR Act, which kick-started all of this? It's seeing Japan at its worst, as a nationalistic, xenophobic, blind country. Saying 'I hate America LOL' isn't brave or cutting-edge - lots of people are doing it, and at least they can come up with reasons.
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no subject
Date: 2006-08-10 01:34 pm (UTC)*dies laughing*
no subject
Date: 2006-08-11 10:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-16 07:38 pm (UTC)The beginning was ... okay. What you pointed out as interesting looked promising to me, too.
Then it got just too weird.
Very stupid sequel.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-17 10:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 02:17 pm (UTC)a can give a valid reason why I think I liked it much... Umm...
well let's try...
I've only seen half of it, but I did like it. Although the
America bashing and the Twin Towers-esque scene were like
"Huh? WTF??", but it wasn't enough to set me off.
The whole team component of this year's BR was interesting and
hard to watch at the same time. It was cool to see two people
dying as a result of one's stupidity and/or total carelessness
but then it got a bit tired.
It was even more exruciating to watch that one girl...she's the
punkish Japanese girl with blond hair...oh, her name was Kasumi,
I think. Anyway, I felt really, REALLY bad for her when she
died in the beginning.
So yeah....I stopped watching at the point where the remaining
kids were taken in and their collars were disconnected. I liked
it all up til that point. I gotta finish watching it. ^_^V
no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 02:19 pm (UTC)Yeah, I felt bad for Kasumi too. That scene was all 'woah. Dude. Intense. In a bad way.'