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Royale 2 The first Battle Royale is easily one of my favorite films, because of it's originality and message about violence in society. When I heard word of a sequel being made I was overjoyed and after reading the plot about the survivor from the first film attempting to take over, I had high hopes. Sadly after seeing the movie I wasn't impressed, but I enjoyed it none-the-less. It's far from being anywhere as good as the first movie, but it does tackle some interesting issues and at least it wasn't just a rehash of the original. The story is about a new group of students that are thrown into the new BR2 act, which was set up to take care of Shuya Nanahara, who was the survivor of the first BR, and who is now a known terrorist. The movie starts off with some huge buildings in Japan being blown to the ground, which is an eerie reminder of September 11th. Then it shows a clip of Nanahara and the "Wild 7" talking about how they declare war on the government and "all adults." This is where the guys behind the first BR act decide to start a new act and throw in some more students to take care of Nanahara instead of using their own men. The students are taken and thrown into an area where a white line is drawn in the middle and they are given a choice whether to participate in this war against the "Wild 7" or not. The catch is if they refuse, they die, so it's not really much of a choice. Around this time we see those pesky collars again, but naturally the rules are different since it's a new act. This time the students must travel in pairs and are given 72 hours to successfully kill Nanahara. If one of the pairs die, the other dies; if they don't kill Nanahara within' the desired time, they all die. They are also given "danger zones" much like the first movie, so that they keep moving to their goal. Nanahara and his group of terrorists are all reportedly held up in a remote island, so the students from the new act are sent there to take him out. This is where the film begins to resemble Saving Private Ryan a bit, with all the gunfire, gritty images, and shaky camera shots. Sending students to take care of the job obviously wasn't a good idea, considering a good portion of them die within minutes of the attack on the island. Eventually we see Nanahara after the remaining students meet up and join forces with him, which I thought was a predictable, but interesting twist. When Nanahara's first introduced to the students he goes on a rant about war and how he even found happiness in a country thats been in war for 20-or-so years, I.E. Afghanistan. The United States was discreetly referred to as "that country" when talks of war was going on. It was obvious who they were attempting to put the blame to without actually saying anything. There are lots of flaws in this movie and it maybe due in part that original director Kinji Fukasaku sadly died in the first days of filming and his son Kenta Fukasaku had to take over. It seemed as though a lot of the characters in the movie were put there just to be killed off and more blood be shown on screen, because a lot of the students had little-to-no character development, unlike the first film where almost all the students had their own personality. An interesting plot-twist in this movie is that the daughter of the original BR-teacher, played by Takeshi Kitano, is in this film and actually joins the BR2 act in order to exact revenge against Nanahara, who killed her father in the first movie. Sadly that key plot-point isn't really fully played out, because after half of the film we are thrown in a plot where it's everyone against the guys behind the new act. On a plus side the movie does have some good battle scenes and it's fair share of blood. I also liked some of the new characters we were introduced to. Sadly the chick that survived with Nanahara at the end of the first BR isn't even mentioned in the movie until towards the end of the flick. I'm not quite sure how to react to Riki Takeuchi's performance to replace Takashi Kitano as the teacher in charge of the operation. His performance seemed way too over-the-top and over-dramatic to the point of being silly at times. On a plus-side, Takashi Kitano had a cameo in a flashback that his daughter has, and the smiling girl from the opening scene from the first BR has a small role in this film. Cameos are always cool in my opinion. In the end I decided on a 7-rating, because I enjoyed the movie, but not as much as the original. It has many faults, but it was good to see some BR action going on again, but sadly a lot of that was drowned out with sappy sympathetic moments and rants from Nanahara. Damn him! I loved the ending to the first BR, but I really didn't like how this one ended. It seemed like the message that they were struggle to get across throughout the movie was all for nothing. Bah. Be sure to look out for the Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ripoff towards the end. OVERALL Comments page 1 of 1:
as this is a completely original story it's unfair to compare it to a movie based on a novel, I actually consider this a Better movie aesthetic wise, and as an original story based on an existing one it's A+
BR2 is more of a war drama. very different from BR1. the students have a new teacher: Takeuchi. reminds me of our mongoloid neighbor. people like him are real! this sequel introduces a new character: Takuma. he and Light were the only ones who survived. it was not shown how they did it. they went to Afghanistan. i liked this. still. Light Yagami's back as Nanahara Shuya. Katano's daughter is featured: Shiori Katano. she wanted to kill Kira. instead, Shiori was the one who died in the end. Noriko appears again. she is now living in Afghanistan. the ending suggests that there will be a BR3.
a lot of people was disapointed with this film was it was different then the first film but i thought it was a goo continuation of the survivors of the first film, warning tho it does contain long speaches
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