Battle Royale Gaiden

January 27, 2004 | 19 Comments

All right, this is for those of you who have been typing "Chiaki Kuriyama", "chigusa battle royale", "BR's Sousuke Takaoka" as well as other BR-type keyphrases into this blog's search engine. When I reviewed the Special Edition of Battle Royale back in December, I didn't say anything about the extras. Well, I just recently acquired the Limited Edition Tin version of the film and I now have the time to do review the extra.

I have to say that I'm very impressed with the extras that Tartan Videos provided in this Tin version of Battle Royale DVD. Not only you got a mounted cell, you also get an extra disc chock full of documentaries and trailers. There are so many interesting documentaries included in the extra disc and this includes 'The Making of Battle Royale', a 50 minute featurette which I think was released seperately as Battle Royale: Gaiden in Japan. In this documentary, we get to see the experience of the young actors who were fortunate enough to be selected to play the roles in this film. Yukari Kanasawa (Girl #6, Yukiko), however, thinks that she's not as lucky as the rest of the actors who got to do a major scene in the film. She seems to be a bit downbeat at one point because she wasn't chosen to play as one of the Lighthouse girls.

Having said that, in general it's really good to see that they all seem to had a fun time doing this film and got along really well with the other cast members. It is obvious though, that shooting this film wasn't an easy job by a stretch of imagination for any of the actors. Kinji Fukasaku really puts them in the deep end and didn't hesitate to ask the young actors to keep doing the scene that they're in until their expression and line delivery are perfect. The result obviously shows in the film. But watching this documentary made me appreciate the troubles that these young actors went through to reach such performance. My hats off to them. I certainly have no desire to become an actor and after watching this documentary, my respect for actors seems to increase a lot.

In a lot of way, the way Fukasaku directs his actors reminds me of the way Hitchcock directs his actors. Hitchcock, for example, at one point while shooting The Birds, actually unleashed a real angry bird to peck at Tippi Hedren so that she'll be really scared. Well, Fukasaku wasn't that bad but he did order Takeshi Beat to throw real chalks instead of fake ones at Takako Baba (who plays Girl #21, Yoshimi) and to really slap Yukihiro Kotani (Boy #7, Kuninobu) on the back of his head while jokingly said that they were hired for this. Speaking of Takeshi Beat, I didn't know that he was the one who drew that creepy illustration that is revealed at the end of the film. I always thought that they hired a manga artist to do that and just make it seem as if Kitano drew it himself. Well, I was wrong, Takeshi 'Beat' Kitano did draw it himself.

Also, it seems to me that most of the time the actors are required to do their own stunts. There is this funny little scene in the documentary where Shin Kusaka who plays Boy #1, Akamatsu really thought that he may get lucky and doesn't have to do his own stunt. Boy, was he wrong because we're then shown footages of him being told by Fukasaku to start rolling down the hill and fall on his back (cushioned, of course) for that particular scene that most of you who have seen the film will remember. That looks really painful and Fukasaku actually laughed after the shooting had ended! And then there's Tatsuya Fujiwara, who you'd think as the lead actor, gets his own stuntman. Sorry, but that's not the case for Mr. Fujiwara who ended up having to do his own stunt where he's required to jump off the window as a bomb explodes behind him. And it wasn't just one take. It was multiple takes.

It's also interesting to see the sort of friendships that are forged within the set. I mean, when I look at the film, it's really hard for me to imagine the girl who plays Yuko (the girl with the poison) to be a real cheerful person in real life. But I supposed that's why they called her profession 'acting' because in real life, she's really funny and get along very well with the other Lighthouse girls. I also noted that Chiaki Kuriyama (Girl #13, Chigusa), Aki Maeda (Girl #15, Noriko), and Takayo Mimura (Girl #8, Kotohiki) are often seen together with one another and goof around while they're on the set. It's weird to me because in the film, their characters never get to meet each other, so I assume their filming schedules are also different and make it difficult for them to meet one another. The only scene I can think of where they appear together is when they first arrived on the island.

Sousuke Takaoka (Boy #11, Sugimura) and Takashi Tsukamoto (Boy #19, Mimura) also seem to be good friends with one another. The two actors have actually worked together in two similar films by now (Battle Royale and Aoi Haru). It's also interesting how some of the actors are quite similar in personality to the characters that they play. Kou Shibasaki, for example, seems to be rather quiet and quite distant from the rest of her colleagues. Tarou Yamamoto's personality, on the other hand, is like the reverse of his character, Shougo Kawada, who's quiet and reserved. Tarou seems to be one of those fun people that makes life more fun than it actually is. He's often seen joking around with the cast and crew and everyone seems to like him. Ditto with Chiaki Kuriyama, who despite her often serious roles, turns out to be such a goofball on the set, especially when she's around Aki Maeda and Takayo Mimura.

Anyway, back to the extra menu, there's another documentary which has further scenes of Fukasaku's directing style. It is clear to me that Fukasaku is the sort of director who knows the sort of scene that he wants to achieve and will do anything to achieve it. Therefore, most of the time he ended up telling the actor how he wants them to react to a particular scene. For example, there are certain steps/actions that the actors must follow when the characters that they play are called upon to move forward and receive their weapon bag. Failing to show the proper actions means another take until it's perfect.

In some cases, this helps the actor, like in the case where Kuninobu makes that mock expression to Kitano. Fukasaku clearly had a specific idea of how offensive the expression should be and therefore attempted to show Yukihiro Kotani, who plays Kuninobu, on how to achieve this particular expression. He also spent countless times explaining to Asami Kanai who plays Chisato, on how he wants her character to throw that pan full of spaghetti. I'm impressed with how Kanai managed to pull of the 'right move' as Kinji wanted it while manages to say her lines with the correct intonation and expression. At one point, she's so convincing as Chisato that all of the other casts and crew were kind of scared at how real her anger seems to be.

Some of the other extras include a short promo about the film, as well as interviews with various lead casts of the film (Tatsuya Fujiwara, Aki Maeda, Tarou Yamamoto, Kou Shibasaki, Chiaki Kuriyama, Masanobu Andou, and Takeshi Beat). Most of the time the casts only say similar things from one interview to another though so watching these interviews once was enough. They're most likely a bit intimidated/overwhelmed by the press and the media attention that surrounded the film. Tarou Yamamoto is probably the only cast member in these interviews who is quite hyper and not too afraid of the media/the press. He often jokes around about how proud he is that he got hired to play a high school student when he's already a 25 years old.

Unfortunately, the Tin version doesn't include the interview from the first Japanese DVD which also featured the second tier actors in the film (Eri Ishikawa, Sousuke Takoka, Takashi Tsukamoto, Sayaka Kamiya, and Hitomi Hyuga) as I find their characters to be more interesting than the lead actors'. The Tin DVD also includes the original theatrical trailer for Battle Royale, with subtitles added to the trailer. There's also a slew other trailers which promotes the release of the special edition. And there's a series of trailers where Quentin Tarantino promotes Battle Royale. It's quite interesting really and give you the idea as to how Quentin get to cast Chiaki Kuriyama in Kill Bill.

Probably the other interesting extra in the disc is the documentary on the making of the additional scenes (mostly the basketball scene). Here we get to see the casts getting to meet one another again after being seperated for six months. Chiaki Kuriyama, Aki Maeda, and Takayo Mimura immediately goof off with one another talking how different everyone looks these days, especially Chiaki (who ended up blushing). What's interesting is that in the basketball scene, Chiaki and Takayo's characters are placed side by side as if Chigusa and Kotohiki are actually close friend with one another. I've always wondered if Sugimura knows Kotohiki because she's an acquintance of someone and since I haven't read the book, I don't know about this. But it's interesting if Kotohiki does indeed turns out to be Chigusa's friend.

We also get to see Sugimura himself (or rather, his portrayer Sousuke Takaoka) having one on one conversation with Takashi Tsukamoto who plays Mimura. They seem to be happy to be working together again although I got the impression that they think Fukasaku is a tough director to please. But in general, they were happy to get a chance to work with him again. The most fun part of this doco, however, is seeing Tatsuya Fujiwara's failed attempts at shooting a basketball into the ring. He failed twice and effectively rendered two film takes into failures. I'm still amazed with the fact that they don't just use a body double who can play basketball to replace him. I noticed that the Japanese film industry still bothers to ensure that the viewers get to see the actors themselves performing/doing the role that they supposed to play. And if the actor has to successfully shoot a basketball to the ring, then so be it. And I think it's kind of a nice change especially when we're so used to seeing body doubles in most Hollywood movie productions.

© memento 2003