Tôkyô zonbi (2005) Reviews

• Zombie movie from Japan... the usual weirdness

  K_Todorov2007-04-23

  Zombie movies have been taking rather weird turns in development recently. We got romantic zombie movies ("Shaun Of The Dead"), we got super-fast zombie movies ("28 Days Later" and "Dawn Of The Dead"), we got super-hero comic book zombie movies ("Resident Evil: Apocalypse) and we got non-zombie, zombie movies (again "28 Days Later"). Well things just continue getting weirder and weirder, and now we got this, "Tokyo Zombie" a completely offbeat, comically silly representation of a zombie Holocaust in Tokyo. Even stranger, the choice of weapon against the undead scourge is neither, swords or guns. It's wrestling, Jujistsu to be more precise. I was interested enough with it's premise but when I heard it starred two of my favorite Japanese actors, Sho Aikawa and Tadanobu Asano, well I really had to watch it. "Tokyo Zombie" as it's name suggests takes place in the Japanese capital. There, due to the unpleasant habits of the local population to throw away their garbage wherever they like to, has caused a large mountain of trash to appear. But people are not content with just that, oh no, they continue burying more and more stuff in that mountain. Ranging from refrigerators, old cars, even people there really is no limit. This is where our heroes enter the story, Fujio (Tadanobu Asano) and Mitsuo (Sho Aikawa), two obsessed with wrestling garage workers who end up accidentally killing their boss. Of course that mountain prompts the obvious solution to their disposition and they naturally decide to bury him there. What they don't know and later find out is that all the dumped trash has created a chemical reaction that causes the dead buried in the mountain to rise again, as flesh eating zombies. Instead of trying to make a relatively serious story director Sakichi Sato takes a turn for the comedic. The plot is an obvious pastiche of classical zombie scenarios. Starting with the zombie epidemic to the post-apocalyptic society, Sato presents an over the top comical side to this all too familiar plot. The overview of how the post-epidemic survivors continue to exist is quite funny, Sato answers one of the biggest mysteries of zombie movie. How do people create electricity when the entire world is supposed to be overwhelmed by endless hordes of undead flesh eaters ? Well the answer is simple. Squeeze Electric a company that supplies all the pollutant-free electricity citizens would need. It works by using state of the art technology, requiring just a few hundred people whose's daily work includes squeezing an electric pod that in terms creates the all needed energy. Everything is completely ludicrous. Characters are no exception, with quirky outright funny dialog and a strangely obsessive singe-minded behavior, they breathe a fresh air of unseriousness to this already not very serious situation. For a zombie movie "Tokyo Zombie" is pretty light hearted. Anyone expecting bucket-loads of gore and blood will be disappointed, there is really only one situation that could be described as disturbingly gory. A zombie starts chewing on a wrestler's guts, the whole thing lasts for less then a minute and honestly rather than disturbing it's quite funny when the victim starts making those silly facial expressions. Midway through the film there is a rather pleasant animated sequence that describes the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse. Other effects are generated using CGI and it's a hit or miss thing. Some look pretty well while other effects are plain cheesy, which is not a bad thing considering the fact that it's a comedy. "Tokyo Zombi" is wacky, wild and in typical Japanese way quite weird. It's fun over-the-top plot makes it worthwhile to watch. Or if you just want to poke fun at the already way too familiar clichés surrounding the genre, this is as good as it goes.

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• Truly, madly, deeply, hilarious.

  mintysandwich2006-11-08

  From the first minute to the end of the credits, this movie is a zombie movie lover's fantasy. Imagine crossing Shaun of the Dead and Kung Fu Hustle and you'll have a small idea of what kind of movie you're in for when you watch Tokyo Zombie. I scour the world of film to find movies that stand out to me as being worthy of owning. I'm very picky when it comes to movies, and I've seen many films that fall into the "zombie" category which end up being nothing short of wasted time in my life once I reach the ending. I am a fan of Shaun of the Dead simply because it not only is a comedy, but it mocks the entire genre of horror movies and zombie flicks. Tokyo Zombie is much the same in the way that you try to open your mind to it and wonder how long it will be before you can accept it's another zombie movie, before you realize that you're laughing hysterically aloud at flying heads and spurting blood. Don't think that you've EVER seen effects like these before. The movie opens to two men practicing Ju-Jitsu, one of them, Micchan (whom believes he has cancer after he forces his doctor to tell him that's what it is after the doc insists it's just a stomach ulcer) and he dedicates his life to helping his friend, Fujio, learn Ju-Jitsu, so once zombies start sprouting from the graves, why not practice on them? The two men accidentally kill their boss, Ujimoto, and decide to bury his body on Black Fuji, a big mountain of ash which there are apparently hundreds of people burying things from satellite dishes to refrigerators to, in a funny scene, the mother of a wimp-like guy who's up to her head and yelling at the young guy's girl who is threatening him with loss of sex if he doesn't bury his mom, but well she's up to her head in the ash and the girl gets tired of hearing this woman's rantings so she punts the woman's head and it flies off the mountain at about 50 miles per hour screaming at her son "Darrrliiinnnnnggggggg!!!!" in Japanese as it flies off to the horizon. I pretty much lost it at that point, laughing hysterically at the comedy of it all. Usually in a movie like this you'll get a 5-10 min break before there's more humor, but no, they keep it going with a school teacher burying the body of one of his male students who he had killed while apparently spanking in school... Well, he was also the teacher of Fujio, and he'd spanked him quite a bit before in the past so Fujio goes down to him and beats the crap out of him with a shovel, and it's pretty funny how he does it. The teacher, you'd think, dies then, but no he gets up a few minutes later to find his pants missing, but is happy to see a young woman come out of the ground who's eyeing his exposed penis with a hungry smile, so he decides to let her enjoy it, and she does, with zombie-like abandon... Immediately following this, the two Ju-Jitsu buddies drive over the wandering body of the boy who's mother's head was booted off into the sunset because they're arguing as to whether or not the teacher had his way with Fujio in the past or not. All of this happens within the first 15 minutes of the movie, well by 14 minutes and 11 seconds to be exact. The movie's script is well done, the acting is quite nice, the graphics and especially the zombies are very well done. I, personally, will end up recommending this movie to many of my friends, and I'm sure that it will become one of my new favorites in not only Asian cinema, but also in the realm of true horror-comedy. If you have the chance to see this movie, don't pass on it, I'm sure you'll enjoy watching it, none of the scenes are over-the-top, and none of the acting seems forced. It's a well-balanced flick which I will keep in my mind's database of A+ movies and I'm sure I'll reference it whenever I try to explain how some Asian movies are well worth watching. I hope this review and my comments have helped you make your decision about this movie.

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• Six rotten thumbs up for "Tokyo Zombie"...

  paul_haakonsen2012-05-12

  "Tokyo Zombie" is exactly what you would expect from a zombie movie from Japan; being cheesy, Japanese people painted ashen-gray, and an overall exaggeration of everything. The story in "Tokyo Zombie" was actually alright. We follow the two very odd, both in appearance and personality, friends Fujio (played by Tadanobu Asano) and Mitsuo (played by Shô Aikawa), working at a fire-extinguisher factory. The people of Tokyo are burying their trash and their dead at Black Fuji, a black mountain of garbage. Toxic waste starts to reanimate the dead buried there, and the zombies start shambling stiffly about, looking for human flesh to devour. And soon after, Tokyo is in a lot of trouble... The acting in this movie was as you'd expect, adequate and silly. Lots of overacting here and the zombies were just hilarious. You need to approach this movie with no sense of an actual serious zombie movie. This is a zombie comedy spoof, and it have so many elements that seen to be making fun of a lot of Romero's movies. So think of a Japanese version of an extreme version of "Shaun of the Dead", then you will have a rough idea of what "Tokyo Zombie" is like. "Tokyo Zombie" is extreme in so many ways, but it works out well enough, because it is extreme in a hilarious way. I believe that "Tokyo Zombie" is either a movie that you will love or hate, I don't see any in-between here. I found "Tokyo Zombie" to be a fun movie to watch, it was a nice spoof of a zombie movie, in the way that only the Japanese can manage to bolster up.

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• This movie was hilarious! But apparently it's not for everyone..

  mwani7512012-09-30

  I really enjoyed this movie. It has a very offbeat comedy that left me in stitches. I happened to rent it randomly from a video store one night, based on it's outer packaging and the line from a critic hailing it as "the Japanese Shaun of the Dead". I was so smitten by the movie that I ended up buying it for myself later. I recommend this if you're already a fan of Japanese Cinema. Especially anime or manga. The comedy is so hilariously off the wall and it's probably different from what we would get here in the States. I will preface the rest of my review with the caveat that I am definitely NOT a horror movie fan. At least not regularly. I watched this movie because I thought I would find it funny, and I did. A lot of other people that I showed it to didn't seem to share my sentiment. haha I don't know why. Many seemed to just find it weird/boring maybe but I found it hilarious. It definitely does have a distinct style and that may be off putting for those who can't get with it. I highly recommend it though and I think it is a very unique and quirky hilarious movie with some of my favorite and most interesting moments in cinema watching. The extras on the DVD are really worth it too. A little about the plot..the film follows the exploits of two Japanese mechanics in Tokyo who are trying to survive a Zombie outbreak. Oh and also they are Jujitsu practitioners. It's so funny seeing Tadanobu Asano trying to Jujitsu a Zombie. They travel through the country on a plan to escape to Russia. Needless to say, they face some obstacles along the way. This is a really quirky and frankly hilarious end of the world tale. It is a little bit long and the pacing and way the story develops may not be what some are used to, but I think if you're a fan of comic books (especially alternative ones), you like manga/anime, or Japanese movies, then you will find this movie as fun as I did. Also there are so many little things in the movie to notice that it definitely rewards repeated viewings. Like a certain snack that keeps reappearing. Also if you are a fan of JuJitsu you will appreciate that aspect as it is represented in the movie. If you get a chance watch the extras because it's really fascinating to see the interview with original creator of the comic that his movie is based on and how he himself is a jujitsu practitioner and incorporated it into his story, and how hard the actors worked to actually learn the right way to perform the moves. Overall to me Tokyo Zombie is a really funny movie and it's well worth checking out. Give it a chance! Keep in mind that it is a bit "different" but if you stick with it, you will be rewarded by a unique experience that may just have you yearning for more....brains!

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• Good Japanese Zombie Film, Not Quite Great

  gavin69422009-03-14

  Two Japanese friends accidentally kill their boss and dump his remains in Black Fuji, a mountain/landfill hybrid. This leads to poor results when the chemicals of the landfill mix with the corpse (and many other corpses) to give rise to a zombie infestation in Tokyo. This is a pretty bizarre film. Two men fight zombies with jujitsu. Not swords, not guns, but face-smashing jujitsu. One of them has a 'fro haircut while the other is bald. It's just an odd pairing. The film has been called the Japanese "Shaun of the Dead". I see it. I think it's a stretch, but I see it. Comparisons to other recent Japanese films, such as "Machine Girl", seem more appropriate -- there's a similar style of dark humor and violence coupled with cheesy CGI. There's also an attempt to connect this to "Ichi the Killer". Don't be fooled by that. "Ichi", along with essentially all the work of Miike, is better than this film. "Q", "Audition", and others just put "Tokyo Zombie" to shame. Perhaps it has the same writer, but the fact this film was based off a manga is evident and infuses a humor that doesn't play as well in live action. This film's biggest flaw is a lack of zombies. Sure, we have plenty of zombies, but there still seems to be a shortage -- there are periods of up to ten minutes without zombie action. These scenes are often filled with sentimental blather. Maybe in the original language this comes off better, but I had little interest in hearing people talk sentimentally to each other. Typically I watch films while drinking, but due to a cold I was not drinking during this one. That is unfortunate. While this movie was above average, it would have been even better with alcohol. The humor is lame at some points, and is either a cultural thing or just plain dumb. I'm uncertain. But all I know is that parts that were clearly meant to be funny fell flat for me. If you like "Machine Girl", I'd say give this one a chance. Perhaps even if you liked "Shaun of the Dead", though the connection is slight. A double feature with this film and a stronger Japanese film, such as "Battle Royale", would make for a good evening. Show this one first, of course. It's decent but by no means a headliner.

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