Another day, another misleading movie title. When I think
about a movie like Tokyo Gore School I’m taken to a place where director Yohei
Fukuda (Chanbara Beauty) has successfully blended The Machine Girl with Tokyo
Gore Police, and law enforcement officers have been replaced by Japanese
schoolgirls. In my head, Tokyo Gore School sounds like the best film ever made,
but then, my head is a curious place to be at times. Turns out The Banger
Sisters is a weepy chick flick starring Goldie Hawn. And Guy Ritchie’s Snatch…
maybe we should leave it there.
Tokyo Gore School doesn’t concern itself with the red stuff. There’s barely a paper cut to be found. What you’re actually signing up for is
a mysterious game spread virally via the mobile phone. Fujiwara (Yusuke Yamada)
is on the top of his game. He’s doing well in class, looks great and fights
hard. One day he's attacked by a group of students without
provocation. In time he discovers that a violent game has broken out in the
corridors and playgrounds of Tokyo’s high schools. I say violent. Have you ever
watched two drunken girls have a fight outside a nightclub?
In reality, Donnie Yen and Michelle Yeoh have nothing to fear.
At least Tokyo Gore School can claim to take a more
realistic approach to schoolyard fighting. Of course, when I say realistic I
mean disappointing. And when I say disappointing I mean monotonous and irksome.
I’ve never used the word ‘irksome’. Consider that a first. And second. Anyway, it
seems that the students have unwillingly signed up for a fight to the death,
and the reason they choose to fight takes the ridiculous to new levels
of absurdity. Each student has a secret; a secret that they’re willing
to take to their graves.
You would expect the secrets to be terrifying. I mean
really, some of these kids are committing suicide in order to save face. So
when the truth comes out, and you discover that the secrets include such
startling revelations as, "He wet the bed until he was fourteen",
much needed tension is taken away. Suspension of disbelief is one thing, but expecting us to believe that the Japanese youth are killing themselves and each
other because a mysterious text pest is threatening to tell the world that they
like to eat cereal at night is an
altogether more troublesome proposition.
Yohei Fukuda would be forgiven had he laced the film with
well choreographed fight sequences and lashings of dark humour, but Tokyo Gore
School takes itself way too seriously for that, and brief glimpses of manic
action fail to impress. There’s very little character development to write home
about, and Yamada’s Fujiwara is about as alluring as a night in with Anne Frank.
The only hint of suspense is created in the final act, but by that time you’ll
be too far-gone to care. Tokyo Gore School sets itself up as a leading
contender for Battle Royale’s coveted crown, but any attempts at social commentary
on bullying, peer pressure, and modern teenage life are lost under a blanket of
ridiculous plot devices, pedestrian fight scenes, and laborious characters.
Much like Anne and the Nazis, you’ll be forgiven for not
realising that this film actually exists, because Tokyo Gore School deserves to
be left in the attic where it belongs. There’s very little to recommend about a
film that attempts to blend Battle Royale’s style and themes with Crows Zero’s
anarchic bravado, and fails to make the grade on both counts. In fact, in
reality, Tokyo Gore School should be put in detention and never spoken of
again. AW
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