The original Battle Royale was a thrilling, at times poignant, allegory for growing up. So how to follow it up? Not with a kids vs. adults terrorist war, that's for sure. It seems incredibly ill-judged to make a film celebrating violence as a means of solving problems in today's climate, and by setting certain scenes in Afghanistan, and with it's anti-Americanism, the film's motives should be questioned.
But first things first. The film has more immediate problems, such as the script, which is for the most part a rehash of the first film. The old kids are basically recast (brooding loner, pragmatic militant chick, psycho, geek etc.etc.etc.), but there is no attempt to establish who these characters are until far too late in the film. I should feel something when I watch kids die on screen, but unfortunately, I was completely indifferent. This inspite of the horribly melodramatic score. I just did not care about any of these characters. The characters I actually DID care about (the survivors from the first film) were reduced to stereotypes, passing on nuggets of wisdom to kids probably several months their junior.
Perhaps, if the cast had been smaller, more time would have been freed to develop the central characters. Seemingly casting every teenager in Japan was also detrimental to the overall quality of the acting. Even the near-legendary Riki Takeuchi (most famous for his roles in Takashi Miike films, like Dead Or Alive and Fudoh, which you'd be much better off watching than this) can't save the film, and ends up as camp comic relief. A real waste of an actor who is an expert at 'mean bastard' roles like this. Unforgivable.
But the main problem I have with the film is that it has absolutely ruined the original's positive message, substituting it with... well, what, exactly? If the writer/director (which, perhaps not so incidentally, was changed midway, after the sad death of Kinji Fukasaku) doesn't know, then how are we as an audience expected to? You can't be irresponsible with material like this, and a film that could be best described as the Japanese Delta Force is worth avoiding.
, il exprime tous les problèmes que je trouve à ce film.
