Review of Battle Royale (2000) by Stanley C — 08 May 2018

BATTLE ROYALE is my favorite Japanese movie of all time!! Even though I think that too much violence in movies that include deaths (especially deaths of children) and glorifying of revenge using weapons isn't such a good thing and it can really psychologically and emotionally damage the viewer, this not only gets the perfect 5 stars from me but also gets my rank as my favorite movie ever. It's no fun watching innocent Asian boys and girls getting bloodily painfully killed, but the movie's scenarios make unforgettable melodrama upon guilt, sympathy, suspicion, pragmatism and secret crush feelings (whenever those components are connected or not) proves that survival fiction works best upon emphasizing the most bitter human emotions (the worse the tragedy and violence, the better the film's quality), and it satirizes the metaphorical game of death, by making it literal on-screen, that students in school feel when they must compete with other students for survival in the future that 1 billion times outdoes whatever shitty garbage made by Suzanne Collins that ripped off this film that has earned better fame than Battle Royale in the United States. It's too bad Hollywood is racist to Asians, they made a whitewashed toned down Battle Royale without Asians.

Here's why I liked the movie so much:

First off, the movie doesn't even give the heroes a chance from the beginning. 40 kids from school are knocked out with gas, then have bomb collars put on them and the adults tell them to kill each other until only one remains, then two kids die before the game starts just because they were misbehaving. Then the kids have to watch a video that just makes them even more scared because they already know the rules which are so easy to understand because it's the most simplest game ever, but the video is just mocking them and striking more fear into their hearts and then the kids got lined up one by one to run outside just like chickens or pigs in a slaughterhouse.

After that, the movie plays a lot of individual short melodrama stories about killing and that the kids realize that they can get a lot of joy and purpose out of playing the game by getting revenge on a classmate who stole her boyfriend or building up secret hide-outs and "mini" colonies but then turning on each other because they don't know how to trust or forgive, or because of the game they are able to express their true feelings for each other like love or having crushes because there is no point in bottling up emotions anymore.

Depicting better emotional and action creativity than most American cinema, this is officially my favorite Japanese movie and my favorite movie ever.