Tokyo Gore Police

What's wrong with Japanese people? Have they discovered a new hallucinogenic that we don't know about yet? Seriously, what would drive someone to write a script that contains a scene where a prostitute's vagina mutates into an alligator's mouth? At least Tokyo Gore Police doesn't dabble in "tentacle rape." And unlike ReGOREgitated Sacrifice, a film that strained to be shocking, this bizarro bazaar (yay for word play) is actually entertaining. Creatures called Engineers are terrorizing Japan, and it's up to a privatized police force to exterminate them. We follow Ruka, a hot cop with a sword, as she tracks down a certain Engineer who may or may not be responsible for her father's death.

There is so much more to the plot, but it's hard to put into words. Yep, it's one of those movies. Let me put it this way. If you want to see a human chair with breasts and a clitoris piss on a crowd of patrons at an underground auction, then rent Tokyo Gore Police. Hmm, where do I go from here? I'll try to stick to the basics. The acting...it's passable. I watched the dubbed version because I was too lazy to go back through the root menu, so I wasn't able to quantify the value of the performances with scientific accuracy. That said, Eihi Shiina is believable as our ass-kicking lead. Most of her co-stars ham it up. The only other cast member who shows restraint is Ikuko Sawada as Ruka's bartender buddy.

Oh, the gore. Honestly, I was let down by the bloodshed. Is this one of the goriest films that I've ever seen? Yeah, but the effects are so crude, that it was hard to get excited about any of the violence. Every time a character would lose a limb, a perfect stream of plasma would dart skyward like a thermal spring. There were several moments where the film veered off into Kill Bill territory. You can't say that about Dead Alive, which is why I consider it to be the best splatter flick of all time. To be clear, I'm not bashing Tokyo Gore Police. I had fun with it. I just wish that every kill didn't rely on the same technical tricks.

On a positive note, the cinematography is breathtaking. Kudos to director Yoshihiro Nishimura for infusing his gore epic with vivid lighting, striking still shots and well-edited action sequences. He found a million different ways to keep the pace rolling. I was never bored, and I didn't feel compelled to check the clock every ten minutes. In spite of those high points, I'm of the mind that Tokyo Gore Police is not the quintessential splatter freakout that it's cracked up to be. Recommended for fans of Machine Girl and Battlefield Baseball.