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62%
Overall Rating
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Ranked #8,538
...out of 20,886 movies
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A team of jewel thieves are caught between a yakuza gang and a mass of zombies when they enter an abandoned factory once used as a site for secret experiments by the U.S. military.
--IMDb
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Review by Chad
Added: January 3, 2005
In this Japanese zombie flick, we start things off with three gangsters: Jun (Nobuyuki Asano), Akira (Osamu Ebara) and Kabu (Okumura Keishi). They get the movie going by robbing a jewelry store, taking a sizable amount of jewelry and gems before getting into their getaway van which is being driven by Saki (Kaori Shimamura), the female of the group. The robbery went off flawlessly... with the exception of Akira receiving a stab wound to the foot courtesy of a store cashier. However, his screams of agony quickly come to a halt when Kabu gets off of the phone with his Yakuza contact by the name of Ramon (Tate Gouta). Ramon has offered to give the gangsters one million yen for the stolen jewelry, and the group head off to an abandoned factory to make the transaction. Meanwhile, a colonel for the United States army has called in Dr. Nakata (Yuji Kishimoto), and informed him of some problems with the DNX project. Instead of being the miracle drug that they had hoped for, they found out that DNX instead turns humans into zombies. The secret laboratory that they had been using to run their experiments is now overrun, with all of the scientists involved becoming zombie fodder. Nakata thinks that the only way to solve the problem is by blowing up the lab, which just so happens to be located inside of the abandoned factory that our gangster heroes are just now pulling into. Back on their side of things, Saki heads inside the factory in order to find some water to clean up Akira's injury, while Jun decides to look around the place. It doesn't take long for the zombies to come out and play, causing our heroes to high tail it out of there... right into the waiting arms of Ramon and three Yakuza henchmen. Ramon insists on finalizing the deal, and laughs off their stories of zombies inside of the lab. The deal winds up getting screwed up, both sides start firing off rounds at one another, and our gangster heroes are forced to retreat into the "safety" of the factory. The DVD tag line of "Everybody Fights" is quite accurate here, indeed.
This take on the zombie genre would make even George Romero proud. While this movie doesn't quite rank up as high as The Holy Trilogy, it does indeed come in pretty high on my personal "best zombie movies" list. The storyline, once it makes its way inside of the factory, is kept extremely basic (a surprise coming from a Japanese horror film). The Yakuza have the gangster's jewelry, but the gangsters don't have the Yakuza's cash. They want to remedy that and escape with their lives. The Yakuza want the gangsters dead, and then to escape with their lives. The army wants the whole place blown up, and need to get to a computer inside the place to remedy that. The zombies just want some flesh to munch on, and they certainly don't discriminate against either side. Each side has a distinctive goal, and each side sticks to that goal throughout much of the running time (until some twists pop up, anyway). I've said it time and time again, but sticking to the simple side of things when doing a zombie movie is always the best route to take, and this is yet more proof to back up my statement.
The storyline, while having enough original stuff thrown in to keep things from feeling like just another entry in the genre, is kept pretty traditional. The zombies still shuffle around, they still eat flesh, and a gunshot to the head will still take them down. However, any fan of zombies with a few watched movies under their belt (figuratively, you sicko) will know that when it comes to these types of films, straying too far from tradition usually doesn't turn out very well. Thankfully, the director of this movie realized that as well, and wound up producing one of my personal top ten zombie films of all time. This movie does mix in a bit of that Japanese style of action, with plenty of infinite-ammo gun-battles taking place between the humans... however, there's not so much as to make one forget that this is, in fact, a zombie movie through and through. Of course, what zombie film would be complete without heaping helpings of the red stuff? Once again, this movie delivers by the truckload. There's ample amounts of guts-chewing action, plenty of zombie brains being blown out the back of their heads, and just the right amount of blood-soaked rooms.
<Spoilers>
Really, the only flaw I could find in this movie was the inclusion of a "boss zombie" by the name of Kyoko (Miwa Yanagizawa). While they very rarely work out in zombie movies, this one was a step above the rest... however, it still managed to bring the movie down a bit. This female lead zombie (seen on the cover with a mouthful of flesh) didn't bring the quality level down as much as previous attempts at the boss zombie have, but it still came off as a minor blemish on an otherwise flawless film. Thankfully, she doesn't get a whole lot of screen time.
</Spoilers>
Overall, if you're a fan of the old-school zombie movies (none of this new-fangled Dawn Of The Dead remake crap), then this one is a must-see. You certainly won't be disappointed with it. 10/10.
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