Gonin 2

Awful just awful. Some terrible scenes with poor acting bad directing and incomprehensible plot-line. The interesting cohesion between the two plot lines was destroyed by plot flaws in both. Rape scenes and ridiculous pseudo-feminism also add to this movies lack of believability. Awful, just awful.

Takashi Ishii's GONIN really blew me away when I saw the dreadful Ocean Shores DVD many moons ago - I think my review at the time contained phrases like "masterpiece" and "hard to fault in any way". I've got the UK DVD (which is hopefully an improvement on the HK disc) waiting to be watched, and am curious to find if it holds up as well as I remembered it, or maybe its flaws were masked by the presentation. I have my suspicions because the other Takashi Ishii movies I've seen haven't been nearly as cool as I remember GONIN being. GONIN 2 being an example.

GONIN was about 5 guys who tried to steal some Yakuza money, GONIN 2 flips the genders but presents a similar scenario. 5 quite different women find themselves caught up in a jewellery robbery, and strange turns of circumstance see them running off with a case full of jewels and the Yakuza on their tails. It's a mixture of feminine bonding experience and nasty yakuza violence.

GONIN 2 shares a certain low-budget feel with BLACK ANGEL, though perhaps not quite as low. It starts off a little slowly and awkwardly, but becomes progressively darker and more perverse as time passes, to the point where it becomes almost inspirational. The 5 girls are all interesting characters (and cute, naturally), each with their own back story that made the act of desparation and possible escape a valid choice for them at that moment in time. The Yakuza on their tales are (luckily for them) mostly quite a thick bunch - but vicious and persistent too. An enigmatic figure with a long coat and a sword also gets entwined in their fate.

The movie has a certain amount of style-on-a-budget charm, and a darkness & perversion that is uniquely Japanese. It takes quite a while to really get anywhere, but develops enough momentum to engage the viewer eventually, and ultimately proves worth watching, if not unforgettable.

This sequel to the surprise hit Gonin features a largely female cast, but like the first Gonin movie, the blood and slaughter are not gratuitous - a rare thing in Japanese cinema - but rather the inevitable result of somewhat justified anger at a flawed society. Unlike the first film, in which five unemployed men tried to rob the Yakuza out of desperate need, the motivations here are not economic. The women all have grudges related to the role of women in Japanese society and the callousness of those around them. It is the social awareness of gender roles that gives the drama its power here, and makes this movie something other than just another shoot-it-out-with-the-Yakuza thriller. The action centers on a jewelry store in the middle of a robbery, where chance throws five women together; how they respond puts them onto a downward spiral of inevitable violence. The grim tone is well counterpointed by the monochromatic visuals; everything has a dusty look to it, and the world of the film seems always to be in half darkness. Bright lights and friendly colors are for other people, just as happy, fulfilling lives are for other people.

I have no idea what the original GONIN is, having never seen or heard anything about it, but when I saw this unconnected sequel for sale I decided to snap it up, having long been a fan of both Japanese cinema and gangster movies. The blurb on the box promised an action-packed outing, but GONIN 2 turns out to be a crushing disappointment, a badly made girls vs. gangsters story that has very poor production values and everything else besides.

On paper, the storyline must have looked good; a story about an ordinary guy, driven beyond his ordinary world into an odyssey of violence, teaming up with a gang of gun-toting women to tackle a group of ruthless gangsters. What it all boils down to is some low-rent melodrama, lots of supposedly arty shots of swirling smoke and dimly-lit room interiors, and more talk than content. Despite the promise of an adrenaline-charged premise, there's little suspense here and even the film's most violent and shocking scenes are muted and easy to miss.

Ken Ogata bags the most interesting role as the vengeful husband, but he isn't given a great deal of screen time and despite being the most developed character in the film, we learn little about him. Aside from one or two slimy faces, the villains are a bland bunch and the girl gang even worse, most of them interchangeable and required to appear in order to disrobe on film and for little other reason. The acting makes no impact whatsoever, and Takashi Ishii's lacklustre direction saps the narrative of both vitality and intrigue. It's a pointless little movie.

Disappointed by the original film, I was hoping that Tadashi Ishii would deliver a better rendition and stark contrast to his stylized and dark feature Gonin with this sequel. The premise was promising. Not only did Ishii replace the five desperate men with five equally desperate women but also added Ogata Ken as a sympathetic male ally to the five `angry women'. I guess I was asking for too much. Gonin 2 is every bit as cruel, blood drenched and gloomy as the first movie. What's more, the Five (Yumi Takigawa, Kimiki Yo, Shinobu Otake, Yumi Nishiyama, Mai Kitajima) are basically underdeveloped characters who are just there to window dress and show off their assets at every opportunity. Fans of the Hong Kong `girls with guns' genre may find this movie interesting but those expecting a Japanese version of Set It Off may be disappointed as I was. Ishii's strong points are his cinematic style and hard edged action sequences but those alone could not save this film. Unlike Gonin, Gonin 2 features no real characters we can understand or care about. Sure, the viewer can sympathize with their individual plights and anguishes but we aren't really given the chance to really care for these characters. Gonin 2 could have been and should have been a much better film, if Ishii weren't so consumed with painting his world with blood and gloom.