Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!
Plot Summary: Various individuals use a mysterious website that organizes group murders to cover each other's tracks.
Review: (Death Penalty.com): Let me first say I'm not sure if you can even buy these movies separate, because there's virtually no information out there on these films. In a lot of ways, it works better as a double feature, as advertised, because both films are extremely short (like 70 minutes a pop) and reminded me of "Ju-on: The Curse" 1 and 2 in the way they would have worked better as a single film; although the plots of these films are not as fluid but thankfully there isn't as much gratuitous filler as "Ju-on: The Curse 2!" If anybody can clear things up with more details I'd gladly welcome such information. Anyway, I'd say the best way to describe this film is a mash-up of ideas from the "Saw" franchise, every '80s slasher ever, and with a hint of "The Incite Mill" except minus a workable budget. While having a low budget doesn't necessarily break a film, it was too noticeable to the point that amateur film students wouldn't even make some of these egregious mistakes. One of the most annoying facets was the misuse of a punching noise in place of a stabbing sound; there's really no conceivable excuse for this and it happens far too often. There were also many problems with the flow of continuity which may have been due to bad editing since I highly doubt there was any kind of script supervisor to be had. At first I was chalking up some of the errors to, perhaps, pointless contrivances, but the faults felt more like stupidity rather than a deliberate attempt to keep the story moving. I'd say there were plot holes, but I think the true problems lay with the technical aspects rather than faulty writing. While some issues are due to errors, there were plenty of simply idiotic moments that do detract from the enjoyment of the film as well. The acting is sort of so-so with terrible delivery from the lesser characters and just acceptable performances from the leads. The pacing and music were somewhat off kilter with some odd choices to say the least which I thought would be the easier parts for a movie like this. As a matter of fact, I was so often perplexed by the decisions regarding this film because underneath all the bullshit there's a pretty good film ruined by the presentation; this is yet another instance of a decent story with original ideas suffering from laughable execution. The premise is that the main guy, Ryuta, works for a wannabe brothel of sorts, but hates his boss and wants him dead. I was hoping they would play up the notion of this brothel more, but it's more of a plot device to create red herrings for the audience. Somehow, Ryuta stumbles upon the titular Deathpenalty.com where he discovers a group of masked individuals that also share his desire to see someone bite the big one. Coordinating the group is another masked individual proclaiming himself to be God. The rules are interesting as there are 6 individuals with each taking turns to play a part in the murder of one of the other participant's victims. The idea is that you create an alibi for yourself in the process while also addressing the fact that people may not have the will to kill someone they know but are more likely to kill a stranger without hesitation. Likewise, you create a mutual affiliation of guilt to prevent others from betraying one another. Essentially, you need at least 4 participants with one person choosing the victim, someone to do the killing, one to provide the murder weapon, and someone to take care of the cleanup. If someone fails to play their part or if you try and quit before the rotation is over you will be killed. To ensure things go smoothly, God employs his "angels" to take care of loose ends as well as the quitters. Ryuta accepts the terms for a time being until one of the other participants, a girl calling herself An, eventually chooses Ryuta as her victim. There was definitely some aspect of the story lost here because we are provided evidence that An knew Ryuta was one of the killers yet still proposed this scenario knowing it would play out preposterously...the problem was that this fact was never addressed or discussed! So as Ryuta tries various ways to escape his fate he further seeks to uncover the identity of An since he believes she is one of the brothel girls. If this isn't your first foray into the realm of horror, you will obviously take notice to an out of place scene in the beginning of the film showing Ryuta encountering some schoolgirls. Well, as you may quickly guess, An was one of those schoolgirls; worse, they put the girl on the cover of the DVD for whatever moronic reason! Maybe the logic was: scared, cute Japanese schoolgirl will lure in more sales! Regardless, I can see how others might not have taken notice and the mystery is presented cleverly enough. It was the amount of intrigue that actually enhanced this film and made it appear much better than it really is. Unfortunately, the ending falls flat as Ryuta goes mad, killing mostly everyone he works with, only to be killed offscreen by the police. There were so many possibilities regarding the direction to take this creative story, but, not only did the makers not capitalize on their ideas, they presented them so poorly with an unforgivable load of technical problems. Overall, I will forgive a lot due to the budget restraints and judge it less harshly, but this could have been so much more with serious polishing up and a rework of the script. It's worth a watch for the creativity, but, with all things considered, it is nothing more than mediocre.
(Death Penalty.com: A New Beginning): A new beginning eh? This isn't Jason 5! Will anyone even understand that reference? Oh well. So this film serves as a prequel to the last one which is dumb because how is it a "new" beginning when, in fact, it is the beginning?! While many of the technical flaws are cleaned up this time around, there are still plenty of noticeable grievances especially one reoccurring continuity error. Stuff like the acting and direction show vast improvements as well. I should note, however, that these new problems created for this entry were absent from the first film combined with a general lack of creativity or imagination. The first film was kind of a mishmash of various other films with some creative ideas, but this film is clearly an homage to '80s slashers whether the makers even knew what they were doing or not. The film opens with a girl killing herself while talking to someone on the phone accompanied by quick flashbacks of a rape (although it may appear to be at a glance, the girl is not An from the first movie). We then cut to something like 5 years later with a group of 7 game testers working on some new game connected to Deathpenalty.com. For whatever asinine reason, they are residing in some resort-like lodge looking for bugs in the game's design. The logistics of how exactly these individuals are testing out the game is severely glossed over as well as any degree of expertise in regard to how they were chosen. Obviously they were chosen to come there to be killed, but wouldn't you as an individual question your own qualifications, and who masterminded the arrangement of an interview and detailed what their job would be, and how the hell did they get there since there's like only one car?! I know you may be thinking why am I asking these questions, but considering how things play out, this could be a huge ass plot hole as we're never given an answer! This time around there are only 4 people using Deathpenalty.com drawing upon the fake game testers as their pool of victims; as always, God is coordinating the distribution of duties and presumably arranged the circumstances we're presented. It's not long before the body count starts to rise as the game testers realize that Deathpenalty.com is real and that individuals are using it and selecting them as victims in real time; unlike part one, the kills occur in rapid succession of one another. Somewhat of a red herring, the film reveals early on that one of the girls in the 7 is also one of the killers but that is only to lead you to believe she is the one running the show. Since this film was inspired by '80s slashers you should keep in mind that all of this will connect back to the girl committing suicide in the beginning. Unfortunately, it does not wrap up coherently and the plot outlined needed to be tightened to bring a better semblance of sensibility as we don't fully understand the motives of God. For example, we don't even learn anything about these people using the website nor do we learn anything about the girl helping God, but I suppose we can assume this was the origin of the "angels" he spoke of in part one? So anyway, the main girl, Mio's, sister, Nana, was the one that committed suicide as we learn Mio is still traumatized by the incident. With everyone dead except Mio and some guy, in classic '80s style, it is revealed the first victim turns out to be alive and was the one setting everything up. Apparently this first victim is also the face behind God and the creator of Deathpenalty.com. I'd love to say he has some awesome motive and that everything comes full circule, but nope! He is doing everything to honor Nana since it was her rape that drove her to suicide, but we are never told his connection to her or why he would care. Was he her boyfriend or admirer or what?! Apparently Nana had started a website to help unite bullied individuals fight back against their abusers but once the bullies found out this led to people committing suicide. In the oddest of decisions, the film went with the idea that members of her site raped Nana rather than going with the bullies being responsible. I suppose this is unique but makes little sense since it would require these wimps to somehow become wannabe tough guys. Eh, it just feels forced to me. Well, the last guy alive with Mio was the cameraman that recorded the rape and God wants Mio to kill him herself. Mio explains to God that Nana was kind and started her website to help people and would not believe in revenge. God relents as Mio and the rapist guy leave. We then cut to God continuing his plan to implement Deathpenalty.com, undeterred, justifying that he still believes the site will serve its own purpose. The problem with all of this is that none of the action has the kind of impact the writer was going for because the audience has no connection or involvement with the drama. I might feel that God was more tragic if we actually knew what drove him to plot any of this. Plus, why involve Mio in such an oblivious manner considering she was put in harm's way? Sorry, but I'm not buying it. The twist was probably planned and written before the rest of the film could fill in the gaps to the story. What can I say? I liked the homage vibe but it was not calculated for shit and suffered from continued errors from the first film. For every improvement over the first film this one added its own problem while lacking creativity as compensation. I suppose it's a toss up, with this entry slightly worse than the first film, but I'll admit it had some potential. When you consider how short this film is, you'd think they would have spiced up the ending with more clarity and beefed up the ending. Overall, as a double feature these are interesting films that attempted to bring some originality while not quite having the means to accomplish such an ambitious undertaking. These films are worth a watch despite their shortcomings, but understand you will probably notice the flaws more often than not.
Notable Moment: For the first film, when you realize the identity of An is the schoolgirl from the beginning of the film. You could see it coming a mile away, but it was an interesting reveal. For the second film, probably when the one girl is in her underwear! She was especially busty and they even featured her on the back of the DVD's cover as a incentive to buy it (that's not what convinced me to buy this though!). She should have been topless...that would have made it much, much better!
Final Rating: 5/10 and 4.5/10
No comments:
Post a Comment