Battle Royale (2000)
[director Fukasaku Kinji]
Color 114 min
I love this movie! This is comparable to, and maybe even darker than Fight Club, the United States’ movie calling Generation X to grow up. This has a similar theme, but it concentrates on Generation Y Japanese high school kids, kidnapped on their senior trip and forced by national law and by their vengeful 7th grade teacher to kill each other with a random array of weapons on a deserted island. In a sickening metaphor comparing life to a tooth-and-claw battle, the last one alive gets to go home.
Battle Royale is one of the most stomach-churning comedies to appear out of any film industry ever. Jokes are hideously barbed in this barrage of slaughters, as a few of the children try to work things out without killing each other. My personal favorite segment is when the “class slut” gets held at gunpoint by a vengeful peer. “Fucking all the boys,”she sneers; “and you had to steal my boyfriend!” It’s a delirious movie, with excellent performances (especially a maleficent Beat Takeshi as the 7th grade teacher) and stunningly assured direction by 80-some year-old master filmmaker Kinji Fukasaku. A perfectly venomous treat.
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