Review of Tokyo Gore Police (2008) by Matthew B — 29 Jul 2009

Review.

Tokyo Gore Police posits a near future Japan where the Tokyo Police Force (TPF) has been privatized to better combat the recent threat of a new species of super-criminal called ?engineers". Engineers are possess the ability to grow fleshy, Cronenberg-esque weaponry out of any wound inflicted on them. Due to this advantage, a special breed of super-cop has emerged called ?engineer hunters? who are particularly adept at filleting the psychopaths into the few dozen chunks required to bring them down for good.

As if that explanation didn't sound totally awesome. Unfortunately, it's not, and I knew how this film would turn out. But, ignoring my bad expectations, I decided to watch this mish-mashed Japanese horror import anyway. I've previously heard nothing but good things from other Japanese horror films such as Audition, The Host, and Oldboy, so I figured when I got my hands on this one I'd at least be satisfied by the amount of bloodletting and repulsive monstrosities that were shown graphically mutilated by a young woman (Audition's Eihi Shiina) dressed as a school girl. Now I know how wrong I was.

In reality, Tokyo Gore Police is fairly exhausting. Clocking in at 110 minutes, it rapidly becomes an exercise in waiting for the next cool mutation or gore effect. The setup for the simplistic story consumes one third of the running time, and there are too many shots that take too long to get started and linger too long before moving on. This adds up to another thirty minutes or so of watching the same arterial spray shower and other repeated elements.

The gore affects here are of the up-most cheapest I've seen. It's affective, however, in that it manages to spray all over - the red stuff literally shoots out of open wounds like a geyser - but at some points you just want it to stop. Not because it's sickening (although to some it may be), but because it gets way out of hand. The monster's are laughable, even though I don't think some of them are supposed to be. The fighting is way over the top, to a point where you don't get any enjoyment out of watching it. Although all these things would sum up your average B-movie or exploitation flick, it's no where near as entertaining or enjoyable.