Battle Royale. Even if you haven’t watched it, you’ve definitely heard of it. If not because of The Hunger Games, maybe from the game series Danganronpa? Or the entire genre of video games named after the film itself.
The beauty lies in the premise. Japan’s economy is in shambles. The youth stop going to school. To instill discipline in children, students are selected by random to participate in the Battle Royale: 42 students provided with weapons, trapped on an island and forced to kill each other until there is only one left. Very Lord of the Flies-esque, but there is no meandering or waiting around. People start dropping like flies (ha) even before the game starts! 1.jpg (Yikes in Japanese)
The rules of the game force the players to be selfish. Alliances may be formed, but they must necessarily be broken as only one survivor may remain. Killing is not an explicit requirement — the alternative is to kill yourself, or be killed. Several of the students choose this path, preferring to die rather than to participate in the game. It’s all some sort of allegory for Japan’s political situation. The extreme right-wingers continually pushing for a stronger military, and the extreme pacifists on the left who would rather their country be invaded and occupied than participate in any sort of conflict. Battle Royale is probably, in a sense, a horror film to Japanese liberals, what with the soldiers dotting the landscape, hitting and shooting civilians and an authoritarian government looming in the background of the movie. 3.jpg Yipee-ki-yay motherfucker
The students are the victims in the story who represent a lost generation of Japanese. The adults, the Gen X’ers who benefited from the bubble economy were now putting enormous pressure on the youth to contribute to society and save the country. Those grievances are personified in the students’ teacher and gamemaster Kitano; behind him, the Japanese government who depends on the next generation to pull their economy back up. But the students are hardly in the position to do so, thanks to societal ills. Main character Shuya has his mother run out on him and his mentally ill father hang himself in the living room with a computer mouse cord. Femme fatale Mitsuko was almost raped as a child when her alcoholic mother sold her body to a pedophile. The adults are depicted as evil, cruel, mean, selfish and useless. But the story still ends on a bright note with some hope for the future.4.jpgEnough with the political stuff. Even though it’s so interesting. The real drawing point of this film for mass audiences is the gore. Yes, the students don’t hesitate to slash, shoot, tase and beat the shit out of one another for survival, and the camera doesn’t shy away from it either. As far as my inexperienced eye can tell, it’s all done using practical effects. None of that Marvel CGI shit. Showing such visceral images onscreen goes a very long way in driving in the theme of every man for himself survival. And it’s refreshing to have a weak main character who isn’t a Mary Sue. It all makes for an unforgettable film experience.
I’m not even going to try to find out who first came up with the concept of a battle royale — something like that would involve going down a rabbit hole deeper than I can imagine — but the premise is certainly original. It captured the hearts of audiences when it resurfaced in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games series as an American sort of retelling of the story (Collins claims to have no knowledge of BR).
In any case, Battle Royale does a fantastic job in depicting our reactions to overwhelming adversity and has some excellent subtle behind-the-scenes social commentary. If you asked me what film would be remembered and rewatched a hundred years from now, it would definitely be this one.