Battle Royale 2: Requiem

The enjoyably histrionic Lord Of The Flies-meets-The Running Man premise of Battle Royale is taken a film too far and far too seriously in this confused, confusing mess of a sequel.

Another class of errant schoolkids is abducted by the Japanese authorities, fitted with explosive collars, and despatched to a bleak island for a particularly harsh lesson in survival. But instead of killing one another, they must fight a band of young terrorists led by previous Battle Royale 'winner' Shuga. To the death. The very messy death.

The opening scene is identical to the first Battle, with a wacko 'teacher' (think Mr Blonde in a leather jacket) pairing up the kids and gleefully demonstrating that if one of the pair dies, so must the other. Then, from the chaotic Saving Private Ryan-like landing on the island to the dreadfully protracted denouement, it's an epilepsy-inducing procession of carnage and cod philosophy.

Had Fukasaku and Son stuck to pure action, BRII would have made for queasy fun. But their propensity for heavy-handed sermonising on the nature of war and society is not only unconvincing, it's boring. If the characters put as much effort into fighting as they do delivering 'profound' speeches, their chances of survival would be infinitely higher.

That's not to say that lots and lots of people don't get blown up, shot, eviscerated and decapitated. They certainly do. Unfortunately, BRII looks like a video game and sounds like a sociology lesson as given by someone who's had too much saké.

This film is basically guts and gunfire entertainment from Japan.

(WARNING!- A BASIC PLOT OVERVIEW NOW FOLLOWS:) Picking up where "Battle Royale" left off, a new class of schoolchildren are forced to enter the BR 2 program in order to eliminate Nanahara Shuya, survivor of "Battle Royale", and now leader of a group of child terrorists comprised of survivors of the "Battle Royale" program, who have decided to wage war on the adult society that has rejected them.

Firstly, it should be noted that although this film may lead you to ponder topics such as:

The global circumstances that give rise to Terrorism. The traumatic effect of combat on children. The foreign policies of the United States. The breakdown of parent/child relationships within Japanese society.

These things are incidental and not what this film is for.

This film is about the good old "bang,bang you're dead", "No I'm not! you missed me!" playground antics we used to get up to as children, only here it's adults only entertainment. Put any kids you might have lying around the house to bed, hang up your film critic hat and hold onto your seat, because this film is about teen bloodshed and bodycount and there'll almost certainly be tears before bedtime! Yes there's a plot, but if you are going to try to take this film seriously you will come to a major hurdle in the first act, as soon as the class's teacher enters the arena to lay down the rules!

Kids - CHECK, Guns - CHECK,

LET BATTLE COMMENCE!....

The original Battle Royale is one of my favourite films of all time. It's fusion of extreme violence and a thought provoking, complex substance made for a very different and refreshing movie. The sequel, unfortunately, is merely a stale variation on the events of the first film. It's ironic that this sequel is a complete disaster as making a sequel to 'Battle Royale' should be one of the easiest tasks of all time. It's simple; another battle royale, with all the uncompromising violence of the first, and to continue the story; we'll have Nanahara, survivor of the first film, put back into the frey. Simple. But no; for some reason, the writers have opted for some drivel involving Nanahara becoming an internationally wanted terrorists and an act known as 'BR 2', whereby school children are 'hired' to fight terrorist threats...or something. Now, you might be thinking along the lines of "well, as long as there's school kids with weapons, I'm happy'; but it's no again. The film plays out more like a feature length version of the start of Saving Private Ryan. That's it; it's more or less a simple war film. Damn.

One of the things that made the first film work was the underlying theme that the violence is coming from children that know each other, killing each other. This gave the film a soul-searching horrific edge; "could you kill your best friend" was the tagline, and the film got it's depth from that. Here, that message is gone; and it's replacement is a dull 'anti-war' one. The film piles on the sentiment in an effort to get it's message across, but it never really succeeds. The film also seems keen to prioritise it's 'Requiem' subtitle. Far too keen, in fact. The requiem sequences were the worst thing about the first film; interrupting the adrenaline pumping action sequences all too regularly, I don't doubt that I'm the only person who feels this way. Battle Royale 2 is much like one long requiem sequence, with characters 'reflecting' left and right and the film on the whole suffers because of this. If the film had focused more on character development, the reflecting parts might have worked because we would have cared; but it doesn't, so we don't. Pretty stupid really.

Battle Royale 2 isn't completely devoid of positive aspects, however; the first half hour is definitely good. Going back to how it was in the first film, we see a group of unwitting school children kidnapped by the government and, of course, the hysteria that results in a couple of the kids ending up dead. Although this is almost a complete copy of the first film (we've got knives being thrown, necklaces exploding etc), it works because the first film worked, and fans of the original masterpiece will no doubt enjoy it. However; when I said that I'd have been happy with just 'another Battle Royale', I did mean one that's different from the first one, not just a remake of it. In fact, the sequel takes most of the ideas from the first film and reuses them; from the danger zones to the maniacal teacher who delights in seeing his kids maimed and killed. The only real new idea in the movie is the idea of the 'tag game', which involves the detonators being linked to each other, so if your partner dies; you go too. However, although this is a fairly good new idea, it doesn't make sense.... you see, the government want these kids to kill Nanahara, so why do they make it hard for them? Why not send them in with an army of tanks and just have done with it? Why not just bombard the island with napalm? On that note: I deem this movie ridiculous and pointless, and therefore not worth your time. Even if you like the original as I do; this film is one to miss.

Bad sequels are especially painful when their predecessors were brilliant and mesmerizing films. Like in the case of "Battle Royale", which was the most controversial shocker in years and probably the only film of the recent Asia-mania that was worth the hype it caused. BR featured a simply absurd story and exploitative violence, yet it worked. The sequel, for some reason, wants to be more ambitious and turns the premise into a gigantic anti-war campaign. Sole survivor Shuya Nanahara of part one has become a feared terrorized who declared war to all adults but, instead of responding, the government sends a fresh shipment of adolescents with death-collars over to the hideout island of Shuya in order to annihilate him. The only really good sequences are almost exact copies of situations that already took place in part one (a giant amount of nasty collar-explosions) but the shock-effect is gone. I normally have sympathy for filmmakers that try something new instead of re-telling the original but in this case the director should have optioned for a screenplay that harped more on the same successful idea. Something's also pretty wrong with the regularity and structure of this film. The first 45 minutes are stuffed with hard-boiled action, featuring for example a Saving Private Ryan-like coast-storming. But then the boredom kicks in and the story begins to live up to its extra title: "Requiem". Endlessly irritating friendship speeches, tedious morality and unnecessary flashbacks completely ruin the tempo of the film and you literally have to struggle yourself through every remaining minute that's left. 134 minutes is way too long for a film like this, by the way. The whole BR2 project is an incompetent mess and not at all recommended. It's too idiotic too pass for a war epic and far too moralizing to become a controversial cult flick.

After loving the first battle royale, I was extremely disappointed in this and struggled to make it through the whole movie.

Most of the faults have already been pointed out. The acting (not really a feature of even the first film) is laughable. Fujiwara, who was well cast as the naive Shuya in the first film, looks totally out of place as a hard bitten terrorist/freedom fighter.

The rugby coach was one of the worst actors I have ever seen, hardly a suitable replacement for Kitano.

The direction is full of choppy cuts, meant to convey a sense of fast paced action but effectively just turns the movie into a bloody mess.

Obviously the movie wasn't helped by the untimely demise of the director. Avoid this one and watch the first instead.