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From the producers of The Machine Girl and the effects and makeup supervisor of Meatball Machine and The Machine Girl, director Yoshihiro Nishimura, comes the latest Japanese splatter-fest that’s already built up a cult following on the festival circuit. Does it live up to its title? What do you think…?
So by now we all know what we’re in for, right? Flowers, swings, fairgrounds, childhood memories… Eh? Hey hang on, what’s up with these opening titles? Ah, that’s better, an exploding head. I was beginning to get worried.
Welcome to a Tokyo of the near future, where the police force has been privatised and criminals known as ‘engineers’ wreck havoc on the streets with their ability to regrow any severed limbs as deadly weapons. Only Officer Ruka (Eihi Shiina, Audition) stands any chance against them, but her troubled mind often drifts back to the vicious assassination of her father, causing her to self-harm herself in depression.
One of the criminals stands out from the rest by more calmly going about his murdering business (rather than running manically amok amid the populace) the mysterious Key Man. Soon Ruka discovers that the Key Man has much more to do the rise of the ‘engineers than they expected, as well as the death or her, but their confrontation will change her life forever.
The sight of the attractive Ruka running round modern day Japan with a samurai sword might make you think you’ve fallen asleep and woken up during Blood: The Last Vampire – there’s even a confrontation of sorts on the subway – but rest assured you haven’t.
For this bleak near-future, Nishimura draws on familiar sci-fi concepts: the merciless over-violent, over-reacting police force echoes that in RoboCop or Judge Dredd, their costumes a mix of Samurai armour and beady glowing red googles of the (again severe) police unit in the impressive anime Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade. Then there’s the police announcer seen only on video screens, whose seemingly inappropriate and perky MTV VJ style resembles that of the presenter of the information film in Battle Royale.
Sure, there’s plenty here for sci-fi and horror fans to get their teeth in to, but there’s no mistaking the biggest influence on Tokyo Gore Police, as Nishimura recycles ideas from his previous work as effects supervisor, particularly on Meatball Machine. For those that have seen it, the idea of human body parts turning into all sorts of cutting, mechanical and bombastic weapons will be quite familiar. It’s a style that draws heavily on the so-called ‘body shock’ horror of David Cronenburg’s eXistenZ and Videodrome. The only difference is that here he takes it much, much further…
Like Meatball Machine, the inspiration itself came from a shorter film Nishimura made in 1995 called Anatomia Extinction. After his work on The Machine Girl the producers offered him the chance to make another movie, which was shot in just two weeks – pretty amazing considering the amount of prosthetic make-up used alone!
Rather tellingly, the film also manages to incorporate some of the ideas behind the bonus short Meatball Machine: Reject Of Death, allegedly made for that films DVD release. There’s the suicidal, self-harming schoolgirl, the more explicit fetish references – even two of the racial stereotypes, the Chinese and Blackman make an entirely unnecessary and rather fleeting appearance. The latter may be an attempt at a running gag, but it does make you wonder just how ‘special’ that movie was after all.
Tokyo Gore Police is darker in tone than its counterparts. It’s said the rather inappropriate adverts seen throughout the movie were actually shot by the directors of Meatball Machine and The Machine Girl, Yûdai Yamaguchi and Noboru Iguchi to, quote unquote, ‘lighten the tone’. It delights in the unpleasant, far exceeding its predecessor’s bloodletting quota, and adding level upon level of repulsive imagery.
True, some if it’s hilarious. A missile-launching penile cannon, acid-spraying breasts, the blood from amputated legs used as jets, all flood light in primary colours like some 80s movie. But often it goes further than even this old dog can take. A scene from a fetish club with mutated female performers ends in an extremely unpleasant take on a ‘golden shower’. (Like that’s not unpleasant enough in the first place?) Strangely it’s the self-harming that unsettles the most – or perhaps that’s not so strange. (After all, it worked for Dario Argento and his writers – make it something everyone can relate to…)
By the time we get to the point when a female character is pulled apart by four cars, beating The Hitcher’s two trucks, any attempt of following a plot – which as it stands is rather reminiscent of the faint revenge and ultimate confrontation of both the former films – is ditched in an attempt to pack in as many ideas as possible. As impressive as this is for such a rushed schedule, the result frequently becomes disjointed (and confusing), becoming more of a collection of set pieces rather than a coherent movie. For instance, a previously unseen police woman with a double-bladed staff turns up to face a now-mutated school girl, herself only fleetingly seen a few times.
Sure, this is one crowd-pleasing bloodfest, but is soon becomes somewhat relentless (in a bad way), lacking the stronger narrative flow of The Machine Girl. Nishimura’s next film is the subtly titled Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl, so once again we all know what we’re getting there, don’t we?
And you can be sure (to misquote one of a certain late British comedian favourite catchphrases) ‘it’s all done in the worst possible taste!’
Tokyo Gore Police is released on 3 August as a 2-disc Collector’s Edition DVD by 4Digital Asia.
DVD details
Distributor: 4Digital Asia (UK)
Uk distributor 4Digital follow up a solid release for Meatball Machine with an even better, two-disc release for Tokyo Gore Police.
The special features, many of which are exclusive to the UK release, include: "Making of" featurette; interview with director Yoshihiro Nishimura; interview with star Eihi Shiina; Japanese premiere footage; TV adverts from the film; original Japanese trailer; original promo reel; UK trailer.
