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Wild Zero
7/10
Well, I have no idea who the band 'Guitar Wolf' is. I take it that they must be popular in Japan to get a movie. But then, Kiss got "Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park". Take that as you may. There is really only one spoiler, which I'll put at the end.
I was intrigued just by the menu screen- we got the characters, the title, the menus. Ok, but then pops up some zombie-looking guy staring at you maniacally, with the occasional 2 flying saucers floating through. We shall see where this will lead, my friends.
Well, characters are pretty easy. We got Guitar Wolf, Drum Wolf, and Bass Wolf. Can you guess they are the band members and what they play? Here's a cookie. Ace is the protagonist that calls upon the mighty wolves when he needs help Tobio becomes Ace's girlfriend, who has Dumbo ears and what looks like mini-fangs.
Hoo-boy, we open with bronze frisbees, or I guess flying saucers, shooting towards earth. Next we get an interior shot with a news report telling the audience that if a meteorite landed in their backyard, do not "use it as a centerpiece or well cover. Send us a fax!" That's right, ignore your blown-away and burning house, and use the always convenient fax! We then meet Ace, who is combing his hair (get used to it, lots of hair combing in this film), some more shoots of the flashy discuses, and finally title card. We are now 1:36 into the movie. I'll be briefer for the rest, I just wanted to give you a feel for the awesomeness of 'Wild Zero'.
At this point I'll give a little tech review. The editing is horrible. From a scene showing a car that has no zombies around (oh, yeah, this is a zombie movie), cut to a different character for about 3 seconds, and back to the car that now has a dozen zombies crawling all over the car. There is plenty of sped-up film of characters running through woods, often with them running through the same space several times. The bad guys get chewed to pieces if a zombie enters a 5 foot radius of them, but the good guys can have a dozen zombies actually pawing them for about 30 seconds to no effect. Now, the effects are a mixture. Some zombies look good. But most look like the zombies from "Zombie Lake", i.e. just painted blue or green. The zombie head explosions are great. The fire coming out of the microphones approaches awesomeness. Ace's hair is an effect all to its self. Other assorted explosions are decent. Discus flying saucers totally fail.
Ace gets into some trouble with bad guys(TM), meets up with the Wolves, and gets the magic guitar pick of summoning. All go their separate ways. Bad guys driving down the road run into a zombie group. Since they are obviously zombies, they get out to yell at them to get out of the road. Ace runs across some zombies and flees to a remote gas station where he meets Tobio. Love at first sight. Goofy graphics.
Zombies keep popping up, bad guys are now super-powered zombie bad guys, and eventually Ace calls on Wolfy for help. Action, magic guitar picks of doom, explosions, guitars with swords concealed in their necks. Betcha didn't think a sword could take down a helicopter, did you? Good guys win, or do they?
Points were deducted for the bad effects, bad acting, and bad editing. But it was a fun, nutty film. I guess I can loosely (and I mean loosely) compare it to a Japanese "Evil Dead 2", minus the cabin and Deadites, and add zombies and flying disci. Hey, I said loosely. Definite rental if you like the hyperkinetic Japanese action/horror sub-genre.
*** Spoiler ****
Tobio is a boy/man. Not that Ace really cares in the end, because, I guess, love conquers all fear of sausage. I guess. I don't know. Again, take it as you may.
*** End Spoiler ***
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