Starring: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Aki Maeda, Taro Yamamoto, Takeshi Kitano
Every so often a film comes along so shocking, so controversial, that society elects to conceal it from public view. Kinji Fukasaku's notorious Battle Royale is just such a film. Despite setting box office records in Japan, Fukasaku's blood-soaked ode to Lord of the Flies remains virtually unseen in North America because the company that owns it, Japan's Toei Company, fears it would inspire unprecedented public outrage.
They may be right.
So why all the fuss? A brief synopsis of the film's plot makes it obvious. A class of ninth graders is taken against their will (but in accordance with an apocalyptic national law known as The Battle Royale Act) to a remote island where they must literally kill or be killed. Students are provided weapons - selected at random, and ranging from the conventional (i.e. a machine gun) to the unconventional (i.e. a pot lid) - and ordered to murder their fellow friends and classmates. Those who refuse are killed immediately by military authorities. Those students who elect to play the "game" have a chance at survival - albeit a slim one, because at the end of three days, only one child can be left standing. If more than one survivor remains, a tiny explosive embedded in their necklace is detonated, killing them instantly.
Welcome to the bleak, brutal world of futuristic Japan - a world so callous that it officially sanctions the vicious killing of children by other children. It's a fictional environment, of course. But in countries like the US - where brutal acts of student violence occur in high schools and on urban streets with alarming frequency - it's a fictional vision that at times appears far closer to reality than we'd like to admit.
Controversy and social commentary aside, the bottom line for movie-goers is that Battle Royale is a well-crafted, unique and entertaining film. Despite its notorious plot, the film is not mired by gratuitous violence. In fact, many of its bloodiest scenes are filmed in a purposely detached manner. Names of the ever-growing tally of dead children appear on the screen with such desensitizing frequency that eventually the once verboten act of teens killing teens becomes almost - dare one say - ordinary. And clearly, that is part of film's desired effect. "I am relating my experiences during the war (World War II)," said the director upon the film's release. "I was 15 at the time (approximately the same age as the students in his film). I saw corpses. I collected and buried them. I learned the meaning of death and war."
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