The 2000 Japanese masterpiece Battle Royale by renowned director Kinji Fukasaku is finally coming to DVD in the United States. The drama? It releases in the same month as another movie about a group of kids that are forced to kill eachother:The Hunger Games.
We’re not here to make the big argument that has been made thousands of times in the past (Did Suzanne Collin’s rip off Battle Royale?) since it doesn’t really matter. They are two distinctly different properties that have the same plot points, like many pairs of movies before it. It would be like saying that Big Momma’s House and Mrs. Doubtfire are exactly the same because they feature men who dress up as women.
Anyway, all “who stole from whom” nonsense aside (Collin’s claims to have never seen Battle Royale before penning her best-seller, and we believe her), the film is a masterpiece that should be seen by anyone that can stomach it. Unlike The Hunger Games movie adaptation that is coming this March, the Japanese version has no trouble spilling young blood in it’s full gory detail on the screen. Check it out below!
So what do you think? Do you plan on picking up a copy of Battle Royale when it crops up on DVD?
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