Batoru rowaiaru (2000)

Director:

Kinji Fukasaku

Writers:

Koushun Takami (novel)
Kenta Fukasaku (screenplay)

Release Date:

16 December 2000 (Japan)

Genre:

Action | Sci-Fi | Thriller

Tagline:

Could you kill your best friend?

Plot:

In the future, the Japanese government captures a class of ninth-grade students and forces them to kill each other under the revolutionary "Battle Royale" act.

Plot Keywords:

Game | Death | Teacher | Japan | Food

Awards:

7 wins & 7 nominations

Cast

Tatsuya Fujiwara	...	Shuya Nanahara - otoko 15-ban
Aki Maeda	...	Noriko Nakagawa - onna 15-ban
Tarô Yamamoto	...	Shôgo Kawada - otoko 5-ban
Chiaki Kuriyama	...	Takako Chigusa - onna 13-ban
Sosuke Takaoka	...	Hiroki Sugimura - otoko 11-ban
Takashi Tsukamoto	...	Shinji Mimura - otoko 19-ban
Yukihiro Kotani	...	Yôshitoki Kuninobu - otoko 7-ban
Eri Ishikawa	...	Yukie Utsumi - onna 2-ban
Sayaka Kamiya	...	Satomi Noda - onna 17-ban
Aki Inoue	...	Fumiyo Fujiyôshi - onna 18-ban
Takayo Mimura	...	Kayoko Kotôhiki - onna 8-ban
Yutaka Shimada	...	Yûtaka Seto - otoko 12-ban
Ren Matsuzawa	...	Keita Îjima - otoko 2-ban
Hirohito Honda	...	Kazushi Nîda - otoko 16-ban
Ryou Nitta	...	Kyôichi Motobuchi - otoko 20-ban

Also Known As:

Battle Royale (International: English title) (UK) (USA)

Runtime:

114 min | Japan:122 min (director's cut) | South Korea:120 min | USA:121 min (director's cut)

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Taiwan:R-18 | Malaysia:(Banned) | Portugal:M/18 | Germany:18 (JK/SPIO) (cut) | Canada:18A (Alberta) | Canada:18+ (Quebec) | Argentina:18 | Australia:R | Belgium:KNT | Canada:R | Finland:K-18 | France:-16 | Hong Kong:III | Iceland:16 | Ireland:18 | Japan:R-15 | Netherlands:16 | New Zealand:R18 | Norway:18 | Peru:18 | Singapore:(Banned) (original rating) | Singapore:R(A) (edited for re-rating) | Singapore:R21 (re-rating) (uncut) | South Korea:18 | Spain:18 | Sweden:15 | UK:18 | Germany:BPjM Restricted

Company:

Battle Royale Production Committee

Trivia:

Although this movie is filled with lots of shooting rampages, only two cast members in two scenes were shot using squibs (small fake blood packs to simulate bullet piercing): Takayo Mimura, who played Kayoko Kotohiki, and Takeshi Kitano, who played Kitano-sensei.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Yuka Nakagawa is poisoned, her face lands in the bowl of poisoned spaghetti. A little later as the girls begin shooting each other, her face is now out of the bowl, and on the table instead.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Reporter: This year Zentsuji Middle School number 4's Class E was chosen from among 43,000 Ninth grade classes. This year's game, said to be more blistering than the last - - Oh look there! There she is! The winner's a girl! Surviving a fierce battle that raged two days, seven hours, and 43 minutes - the winner is a girl! Look, she's smiling! Smiling! The girl definitely just smiled!

Movie Connections:

References "The Prisoner: The Chimes of Big Ben (#1.1)" (1967)

Soundtrack:

The Blue Danube Waltz

Disturbing

Battle Royale is based on the shockwave novel by Koushun Takami, which is a bestseller in Japan, and which has become very controversial in a very short time (and it is really easy to understand why). The plot is relatively simple (a class of junior high school students are forced to kill each other on a desert island, the last survivor wins and can go back home), but it is this simplicity that makes its strength. No need for a very long prologue before we enter the main act. Each of the 42 pupils involved in this "game" are not volunteers (no one would be..,), and of course they are forced to kill their best friends /girlfriends in order to survive this horror. The personalities and characteristics of each of the participants are of course very contrasted and even if there are some cliches, well, the worst has been avoided. There are even quite "realistic" (even if it is very difficult to judge what can be realistic with such a plot) moments. The transcription of the inner thoughts of the characters, which is one of the strengths of the book, is averagely well retranscripted. Takeshi Kitano plays a "teacher" (whose name is ...Kitano), leading the operation of surveilliance of this "game". It is very difficult to give an objective comment on this movie. Violent. Ultra-Violent. And bloody. This is for sure. The book has to be read for a more complete description of the hesitations and fears, but the movie restranscripts very well the book is the sense that it is all "absurd". There is no real meaning to this violence. The students know this, but it can not be avoided. It is quite sad that the movie dropped an essential background element of the book (the story in the book takes place in an imaginery Japan which would have not lost WWII, and the movie takes place in a slightly modified modern Japan), but I guess that making this happen in the "real-world" shows that there is no need to go to an imaginary world to see to what extreme behaviors humans are capable of.

Highly disturbing. Rated R-15 (forbidden to under 15), very, very violent, but nonetheless interesting.