| Plot: There are 666 portals that connect our world to the "other side." The 444th portal lies in a place called The Forest of Resurrection. A deal between two convicts and a group of yakuzas go from bad and then to worse once the dead start coming back to life. Will they make it out alive, or will they become brethren with the undead? Review: Ladies and gentlemen, what we have here is the Japanese equivalent to Army of Darkness. Versus is a movie I have just added to my list of camp classics, and it's a damn shame I didn't get to view it a second time. However, once is definitely enough for this movie. Versus mixes Evil Dead with a heavy dose of yakuza gangster movies and throws in a couple of extras too. So with all the good I'm about to say about the movie, let's get the bad out of the way first. My only major complaint is that there were no names given out to the characters making it damned hard to keep track of the characters. The main character's name is Prisoner KSC2-303 for crying out loud, it doesn't exactly roll off of my tongue. The rest of my complaints are minor, but it seemed like the whole "reincarnation" plot device was just stuck in there for the sake of having them all dress up in feudal Japanese clothes and sword fight. The story just seemed kind of tacked on and didn't really go anywhere until the last part of the movie. Lastly, the movie turned a bit too seriously during the end, but still retained some of the cheesiness it had at the beginning. So now that we've all swallowed the bitter, it's time to move onto what made this movie great. The movie picks up fast with zombies appearing and it's not too long until we see a huge gunfight between the gangsters and zombies. The gore, while laid on fairly thick, is pretty fast so if you look away for a second you might miss it. And believe you me when I tell you that you don't want to miss any of the gunfighting, kung-fu, and crazy sword fights that abound in the movie. Maybe the kung-fu fights look silly in retrospect, but they never lagged so long that I'd lose interest (same goes for the gunfights and sword fights) and they kept the wire stuff to a minimum. Another huge plus to Versus is that just about all the main characters were dubbed in English by the same people who do the dubbing on the anime Ruroni Kenshin. Yes! As for the original Japanese dialogue, I didn't get to hear it since I only watched it the one time. As far as acting was concerned, while most of the actors over-acted their parts (Kenji Matsuda especially), they were still pretty good. The main girl in the movie I didn't really care for, though, and her presence didn't add much to the movie other than to weigh it down. Kenji Matsuda just completely hams up his role as one of the gangsters for all its worth. Matsuda's shtick got so many laughs out of me I lost count. By the end of it he's still hamming it up, even as a zombie, but it wasn't as funny as it was at the beginning. Tak Sakaguchi played Prisoner KSC2-303 with Belmondo-coolness and it worked for me. That's all I could ever ask for out of a performance. Minoru Matsumoto played the one cowardly gangster who's always missing and saying "It's not my fault!" He got a few honest chuckles out of me here and there, but after a while his routine grated on my nerves. Hideo Sakaki plays Sakaguchi's nemesis in Versus and he does pretty good. Sakaki is focused, always serious, and of course evil. Sakaki is also Belmondo-cool. I'm not exactly sure what "Belmondo" means (I read it on the back of a movie's box), but it sounds to be a damned good thing if you ask me. And the two cops managed to make me laugh a bunch too, even though their presence in the movie wasn't explained very well. When I heard the one cop saying "My reflexes are 500 times faster than Mike Tyson's!" I think a new movie quote was born. Everything about the movie is cheesy. The plot, the characters, and the action, everything. But cheesy doesn't mean it's a bad thing, because Versus was a damned fun movie through and through. Granted the plot fell off its wheels and got a bit too serious near the end, but all in all it was a very entertaining ride. Versus is an action/horror movie that goes the Evil Dead route by giving the audience funny scenes as well as plenty of kinetic sequences to back itself up. It runs at a lighting fast pace and doesn't slow down until the finale. It's littered with action sequences as not one minute of the movie was dull. Versus is an immensely enjoyable no-brains type of movie where you can just back, relax, and watch the blood hit the screen with glee. Trust me, Versus should be your next rental. |
| Rating: ***1/2 |
| Review by Jim |
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