Today’s quick review: Battle Royale. In the near future, a 9th-grade class is selected by Kitano (Beat Takeshi), their bitter former teacher, for Japan’s Battle Royale, an annual three-day contest where the students are forced to kill each other to survive. Close friends Shuya Nanahara (Tatsuya Fujiwara) and Noriko Nakagawa (Aki Maeda) team up with Kawada (Tara Yamamoto), a veteran of the game, to try to make it through violent struggle alive.
Battle Royale is a Japanese action horror movie that pits 42 teenagers against one another in a fight to the death. Battle Royale is the quintessential death game movie, sporting brutal violence, a simple but effective premise, and plenty of character-driven drama. The movie’s dark tone, copious amounts of gore, and immense cast can make it a tough watch for the wrong viewer. However, its craftsmanship makes it a worthwhile investment for the right one.
Battle Royale takes greater pains with its material than most other films in the genre. Each of the students gets at least a brief treatment, with a specific personality, backstory, and tragic end. The movie lays on its drama thick but artfully. The travails of adolescence play a large role in how the students react to the violence around them. Rivalries, unrequited crushes, and old trauma all boil to the surface over the course of the game.
Watch Battle Royale when you’re in the mood for something dark, brutal, and occasionally uplifting. Not everyone will enjoy what the movie has to offer, but those who can stomach its violence and track its many characters will be treated to a tense, sprawling battle of wits, nerves, and cunning. Sensitive viewers should steer well clear. For a flimsier, action-oriented take on the death game genre, try Death Race, Gamer, or The Tournament.
7.7 out of 10 on IMDB. I give it a 7.5 for careful drama and well-crafted violence.