This past week I watched two movies that could not be more diametrically opposed. One was The Hurt Locker, which reminded me that computer graphics and spastic millisecond edits are no substitute for standbys like strong characterization and fascinating subject matter. The other was Battle Girl Vs. The Living Dead In Tokyo Bay, the title alone of which tells you what’s up. Just typing that title alone put a stupid smile on my face.
Battle Girl came out of an odd moment in the Japanese film industry, when the video market was booming and production companies were slapping together movies that jumped on every bandwagon that had wheels, all to fill shelf space at rental stores. For indie filmmakers it was good news: they could often find money for films that might not otherwise have seen the light of day, and a lot of really wild stuff — Death Powder, or the Evil Dead Trap flicks — made it to the screen because of all that. Battle Girl is a the lower end of the spectrum: it’s notable mostly for female pro wrestler Cutey Suzuki in the lead role, and for being out of print for decades. You’ve heard of B pictures; here’s a B rental.
Crack Cutey Kicks Zombie Butt. More At 11.
The plot. Oh, that. This big ol’ meteorite crashes into Tokyo Bay, isolating the city from the rest of the country (don’t ask how), and the few people that aren’t killed outright either get turned into zombies (again, don’t ask how), fugitives, or Mad Max warriors-of-the-wasteland types. One of the survivors is K-ko (Suzuki), who struggles into the secret lair built by her father and dons the Battle Suit he left for her, the better to fight the zombies. Along the way she saves a hoard of scavengers living out of retrofitted bus, kicks a fair six-pack of zombie butt, learns of terrible things planned for the rest of the human race by the military, and faces down a crack half-zombie human-extermination squad.
Much of this sort of thing comes down to specifics — little details, things that make you smile because the whole of it is fairly disposable. The director was “Gaira” (Kazuo Komizu, of Guts of a Virgin/Beauty), and he has intermittent fun with the material even while he’s at the mercy of a pretty banal, unadventurous script. The story never really cuts loose with the kind of loony invention that I’ve come to savor most from these kinds of films — e.g., Machine Girl — but it’s fun to watch Cutey Suzuki strap on her armor and blow the cheese out of the bad guys. It also ends right when we know there’s a lot more left to happen, which implies that the door was left open for a follow-up which never got filmed. It’s not hard to see why.
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Sounds extremely bizarre. I am intrigued ;)
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