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Full Metal Yakuza AKA Full Metal gokudô
R2 - United Kingdom - Artsmagic Review written by and copyright: Rob Hunt (14th July 2005). |
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The Film
 The film's main storyline revolves around the character of Kensuke - a Yakuza who idolizes one of the top dogs (Tosa) - but whose job is to scrub the floors, as he is useless at doing anything else - chickening out at the last minute during assignments he is given to work on. He is also shown to be lacking in other areas too - namely the size of private parts and his skills (or lack thereof) in bed. He is even humiliated by a bunch of youths in a park. By all accounts, Kensuke is a loser. Kensuke is there for Tosa when he is released from prison, but is unlucky enough to be killed alongside Tosa by some of the other Yakuza. Sometime later Kensuke wakes up, confused as to his location (and the enlarged size of his penis). He steals a bicycle and attempts to escape - unaware of his new-found strength. He re-confronts (by accident) the bunch of youths who humiliated him, but this time Kensuke humiliates them. It begins to rain and he short-circuits, just before his creator (the self-proclaimed "Nutty Professor") picks him up and brings him back. He discovers he has been reassembled as a robot, but with the heart and genitals of his idol - Tosa. After regaining some lost memories about his death, he decides there is only one thing he wants - revenge. Takashi Miike is best known to me (and perhaps others too) for his 2001 controversial film "Ichi The Killer". More recently I have known him as the director of "Happiness of the Katukaris" - both fairly different films to "Full Metal Yakuza" - in terms of story structure and tone. In "Full Metal Yakuza" the story is taken lightheartedly and with a sense of random humour interspersed among it. I did not quite know what to make of this film upon first viewing - it took me a short while to begin to understand the story, and even now I am utterly confused by the ending - I think I know what happens; I'm just unclear as to why. I also found the low budget effects to be a distraction (although this seems to add to it's 'cult' status) - but nowhere near as much as the pixilation used for all instance of genitalia - making them look even more ridiculous than they were supposed to in the first place. It was interesting to explore the film a second time with the Commentary - as well as the extras - which both commented on the film's similarities to "RoboCop" and "Re-Animator". I found these two references in the film to be interesting - they were not ripping off either of the aforementioned, but were evidently inspired by some ideas used in them. The music and composition used in the film felt a little shallow, but overall it was not bad. The cinematography was used fairly well - especially considering this was a straight-to-video release - with the camerawork utilizing some interesting angles and shots. In the end I found the film fairly entertaining - with some good humour and violence in some places, but nothing particularly incredible.
Video
Artsmagic have given this disc a 1.85:1 Anamorphic transfer. Given that this film went straight to video it's no surprise that this transfer is not amazing - and with that in mind I think the transfer is possibly as good as it could get. The only issues I had with it were that it appears quite soft throughout, with a lack of detail and that it appears a bit dark/murky - but other than these (which may not have been avoidable) the image holds up fairly well.
Audio
Audio comes in the original Japanese language (with optional English Subtitles) and is presented in 2.0 Stereo. The track is not bad, but during some of the more action-based scenes it would have been nice to hear some surround action - if only on a 2.0 Surround track. However, given the films low budget I am fairly satisfied with what is on offer.
Extras
This disc comes with a fair few extras. The first extra I examined was the Commentary by Tom Mes (in English). It was a fairly interesting commentary (for the most part) and kept my attention for nearly the whole film. There were little amounts of silence - although I did wonder where he disappeared to briefly at the end, and he finished quite abruptly. Not an amazing commentary track but definitely not a bad one either. Next up was the Takashi Miike Interview - running at 33:18 this is a fairly substantial extra, covering some interesting questions. Rather annoyingly, to me it appeared that the burnt-in subtitles only translated 2/3 of what Takashi said - but I could be wrong. What was presented was worth a viewing - but only once. Then there is a Yasushi Shimamaru Interview - which runs slightly shorter at 14:12. I found this to be more informative than Takashi's Interview and it kept my attention longer. Bio/Filmographies contains Bio/Filmographies for the director Takashi Miike along with four of the actors, and is an interesting read. One of the better bio sections I have come across on a DVD. Previews contains trailers for "Malice@Doll" <1:39>, "A.LI.CE" <1:28> and "Blue Remains" <2:46>. All are presented non-anamorphiclly, in the original language but with burnt-in English subtitles, and all are a cross between animé and CGI - a combination which does not interest me in the slightest. For those who enjoy CG animé this might be interesting, but for me it did nothing - not least because it had no relevance to the actual film on the disc. Artwork is a 0:33 slideshow of disc cover art set to some music - not bad, but nothing particularly exciting. Finally, Website is simply a static page with the address for the "Eastern Cult Cinema" webpage.
Overall
This is a pretty enjoyable film from Takashi Miike - albeit one which needs to be taken lightly - and Artsmagic have definitely improved the viewing (or so I found) with their DVD. Whilst the picture and sound are limited this does not distract from the viewing too much. The only issue I would have is with the pixelation/censorship, but this (thankfully) only occurs two or three times throughout the film!
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