Occasionally exciting but poorly paced follow-up to Yudai Yamaguchi's 2005 splatter punk film. The film is essentially a 40 minute introduction followed by a 50 minute non-stop monster melee on the streets of Tokyo. Yoshihiro Nishimura once again excels with his inventive low budget monster design and entertains the audience with the usual blood showers as well as a "topless chase scene". Unfortunately he also uses some depressing CGI and green screen sequences, and relies too much on drama that fails to engage during the first act. Another problem is that Nishimura has never been a very good action director. The fights often seems like random moves and clips edited together. Composer Kou Nakagawa played an important role in making Nishimura's earlier films so effective, but for the past few collaborations his work has been repetitive and less interesting. The film remains, however, quite watchable and at times even exhilarating despite the issues.
Girl Boss: Escape from Reform School (女番長 感化院脱走) (Japan, 1973) [35mm] - 4/5
The 5th film in the series. This one keeps getting better every time I see it. The film comes with genuinely cool characters (especially after the nasty, misogynist Girl Boss Revenge), badass girl power, groovy soundtrack, and bits of good humour instead of dumb comedy. Cool without being too flashy, except for the reform school's standard punishment method which is stripping teenage girls topless, tying their hands behind their back and leaving them in a cell alone. Hah! I also liked Kenji Imai, an actor I normally don't pay much attention to, as the reform school teacher chasing the escapees, and of course Tsunehiko Watase as a young robber who hooks up with the girls. Watase is always good at playing these kind of rough but somehow pitiable characters. The film is, generally speaking, a little more believable than most other films in the genre, which is probably why it doesn't initially stand out but grows on you on subsequent viewings. Oh, and needless to say seeing this from a near pristine 35mm print on Shin Bungeiza's large screen was a blast.
