Fantastic!

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Film is very good. U have to know what is going on from the start or u will not understand the ending like me . some parts were not needed like kitano was shot ,he died but he received a call talked on the fone & died again.so yea apart from that and other few scenes ( very few ) film is very goood

I watched this because someone had mentioned Hunger Games not being original (and nothing is really) and it peaked my interest as I was curious. I went into this thinking it must be good if someone made the connection, but note I still knew it was IT'S OWN THING. So none of this has anything to do with H.G. it's just how I found the movie. Just to start, I saw this was a book and surely the book is better than the movie because surely the movie was like this because of the typical book to movie problem of not enough time to tell the story. The plot is alright, though they didn't go too much into it. Kids are little turds, adults don't like it, let's have them kill each other; in laymen's terms. It started off strong and while overall it was a decent movie I wouldn't recommend spending 2 hours on watching it. It ends pretty much how you think it will, the people you think will win do, and the fights you think will happen do. It's predictable but most movies are. My main problem with the movie is there are just too many characters. I get it's an entire class, but they try to fit too many back stories in. I get that some of them are problems in Japan, but trying to make me feel bad that someone is dying because he never told his crush how he felt? When I did start to feel bad for a character and genuinely felt bad for them, the scene is ruined by the worst death acting I've seen. More than twice, maybe even more than thrice, they'll have a touching moment and then just let their head fall. I got a good laugh each time. I get your head will fall but some of it is unnecessary and out of place. Some of the way people acted out dying was so ridiculous and I couldn't help but laugh. Even in the touching ones, I'd feel and then they'd do the absurd head drop, even if it's not needed (one girl had her head resting on a guy's shoulder but made a point to throw her head forward to emphasize her dying). Aside from the absurd death scenes, they have no respect for realism. SO many characters take at least a dozen if not more machine gun shots and still get back up like they just got punched instead. They'll have two dozen rounds in them but stand back up to try and run or make some plea and it just got to the point where I couldn't take any of it seriously. The blood and effects don't bother me. They're used (mostly) properly and make sense, people are dying of course there's blood. Overall, I couldn't take it too seriously. It's a good movie for some laughs. It's an okay movie otherwise. TLDR, bad acting, too many characters, funny death scenes, okay but predictable. SpoilsAlso the only time someone reloads is the 'bad' guy and it's after you've wondered for the 5th time if he'll run out of bullets. Is he really the only one to get extra ammo? There's only one other uzi we see and I get they'd maybe give him a lot of ammo but if they're going to give a bunch of kids pistols to kill each other, I'm sure they'd give them ammo. So many people but that dude (except the one time because plot convenience) ran out of ammo. I get it'd get boring but if you're going to have them reload at all give some other people a chance. Not really a spoiler but I guess somewhat. At the end in the streets there are flags with the tele-tubbies on them. Just something amusing.

WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE MOVIE AND THE BOOKAnime-style gun battles: people get shot dozens of times and suffer no ill effects, except the one bullet delivered after a "cool" or "gut-punching" line of dialogue.Due to the sheer amount of crushes there is hyper-inflation in the value of romance in this movie. In other words, if everyone is love with everyone else then there is actually zero meaningful romance in the movie.Interesting characters die quickly while boring characters survive. Interesting characters never fight against interesting characters, its always Boring vs Interesting. Imagine if Sickle Girl had to confront the heroes, or if Bleach Haired Guy had any characterization other than deadly guy who teleports around the island. You never think to yourself, "Oh no, two characters I'm rooting for are fighting each other!"Just pick two or three relationships with backstories! There's no point in squeezing an entire backstory between two characters in 90 seconds before they kill each other! Forget half of these stories! Take Track Suit Girl, build up the story -- ending with her stabbing her attempted rapist in the dick -- and make it bigger!The acting is awful. Every time a character does their death soliloquy and pantomimes dying it was laughable, especially Beat Takeshi! Who is supposed to be good!The use of classical music is the definition of pretentious: it shoots for deep meaning and falls flat on its stupid face. If its supposed to be a humorous juxtaposition then - no, this movie totally lacks humour and is entirely self-serious.There is no meaning in the movie. A statement on older generations abusing and destroying the futures of their children, this movie is not. This movie is about screaming and arterial spray. (In the book, Japan is a dystopian country ruled by a totalitarian government. The winner of the Battle Royale receives an income and an apartment for life. These two details give the work enough meaning to push it past the threshold from "exploitation film" to "John Carpenter-level commentary")As an exploitation film there are no memorable heroes or villains, just a couple of cool deaths, no stand out special FX, a lame-duck twist (Beat Takeshi was stabbed in the butt and that's when he decided to become... a lame dude...). IIRC the book's climatic battle is with characters lobbing grenades at each other while in a car chase. Probably outside this movie's budget :(

After so much praise I watched Battle Royal - and well, I am one of the ones who just don't get it: cheap production, at top mediocre acting, and well, a not so clever and inventive idea as many people claim.Many viewers claim that Hunger Games is a kind of copycat of Battle Royal but let us get this straight:The movie originates on the novel Battle Royale by Japanese writer Koushun Takami - written in 1996. But I can remember two stories (!) of almighty Stephen King - The Long Walk from 1979 and The Running Man from 1982 (dystopian societies, ppl fighting for their lives in a game). Or what about movies like The Blood of Heroes (1989), Rollerball (1979) or Deathsport (1978) and and and. You want teens!? What about Solarbabies from 1986!? It is easy to see that the material of Takami isn't that original at all. Also, if I remember my history lessons right, there is something like gladiators in the times of the Roman Empire... If someone claims that Hunger Games is a copy-cat of Battle Royal every vampire movie after Nosferatu from 1922 is a copy-cat too;)Battle Royal is imo in no way (a) original as many claim and (b) all in all a poor to mediocre executed movie. A movie like Fight Club or Clockwork Orange is rightfully considered as a masterpiece or cult - original stories, excellent acting, excellent directing, excellent camera- work and setting and and and, but Battle Royal!? Objective and subjective it got none of that. Battle Royal a masterpiece!? Nah. If you wanna watch some original sci-fi I recommend you to watch Zardoz (Sean Connery) from 1974. Last but not least, Hunger Games is in every way the better movie (or let's say version) of the theme "dystopian society and gladiators". Alone the performance of Jennifer Lawrence beats everything in Battle Royal - the acting of most actors in Battle Royal is just terrible bad. And to the gore level, well if I wanna see gory stuff there are lots of flicks which are way more gory as Battle Royal is. I guess Battle Royal is imo mainly overpraised by juvenile Manga-fans and Cosplayers and fanboys of Asian pop-culture-Kitsch (that kind of folks who think these Asian cos-or-whatever-they-are-called bands really play rock'n'roll - and no, they don't).Last note: in a certain kind of way the movie is "clever" constructed as many men in Japan have certain fantasies about schoolgirls in short skirts - many Mangas are prove of this "notion" ;)