A Review in Pictures: Helldriver

I never thought that you could out-do yourself, Nishimura!  In 2008, Yoshihiro Nishimura went from doing Special Effects and Make-Up work on films to actually Directing.  The film- Tokyo Gore Police.  I love that movie for all of the reasons that any sane man would think that it's bad.  It's ridiculous, over-the-top and features the most phallic gun ever.  As I mentioned in my review, when a cameo by Satan is the least weird part of the film, something is up!  Nishimura has done a couple films since that one, but this is the first one to really get a release here.  Why must I wait to watch Mutant Girls Squad, dammit?!?  In the meantime, I can enjoy Helldriver, a film that combines the zombie genre with a hint of alien invasion, a revenge tale and the story of a corrupt government.  It's like War of the Worlds, Oldboy and Land of the Dead all rolled up into one!  Mind you, the plot has none of the coherence of any of those three films.  As a bonus, the title card and credits appear 48 minutes into the film!  Put it either at the beginning or the end, but pick one!  So as not to SPOIL the film too much, it's time for an old-fashioned Review in Pictures.  Context is for pansies!  To find out little, but see a lot, read on...

The film involves zombies- with a sci-fi twist- running amok amidst one young lady's quest for revenge against a family member with a familiar tattoo.  Kudos to Nishimura for getting Eihi Shiina back for this film too.

 ****

 ****

What do the zombies have to do with this lady encased in what looks like amber?  Who dresses their guards like Pyramid Head?  How much faked blood is too much fake blood?

 ****

 ****

Alien spores make zombies that control half of Japan!  Japan's Prime Minister dresses like a combination of Hitler and Mussolini!  Alien zombie heads used as a dangerous projectile!  All of this in just the first hour of this movie.

To find out the rest- and to get context- you'll just have to check it out.  The End.

 ****

 ****

This is just pure, unadulterated insanity!  That's really the best description of this amazing and weird movie.  So little of it makes sense or appears to take place in any type of reality that you could imagine.  The plot involves a meteor, zombies with antennae and a woman with a chainsaw sword.  Only in Warhammer 40K and this film!  The whole thing is just crazy.  It may sound like I'm being redundant here, but there is just no other way to describe this film!  I'm barely even scratching the surface of the film's ridiculous plot too.  There's a prison that uses medieval torture devices as cells.  There's a scene with people battling flying zombie heads away with a sword.  There's even a scene where a man's head is ripped off in a car, leading to about three minutes of non-stop arterial spray!  I didn't even watch the whole movie, but I can easily say that Nishimura has out-done TGP in terms of ridiculous action, gore and effects.  I didn't think the plot was as strong as that movie and it also features a no-context opening kill scene a la Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl or Robo-Geisha.  What is the point of those?  If you like to eschew plot for insane gore and freakiness, this is the film for you- hands down!  Take us way, overly-ironic mascot...

Next up, a week of Full Moon films.  First up, a movie that combines Full Moon's track record with comedy and drug jokes galore.  Stay tuned...