Junk

Rating:
Summary: Um...no.
Review: I bought this DVD because I enjoy Japanese cinema - stuff by Takashi Miike, you know the drill. This movie has terrible acting, bad make-up and gore effects, and is almost completely worthless. It's stupid, and almost painful to watch. I figured with being made in 1999 - and released in 2003, it would be relatively up-to-date with it's filming and effects - but it looks like a heaping pile of B-Trash from the early 70s. You can't pay me enough to watch it again. All of you other people who gave this movie high marks must be happily living in the past - or you haven't seen a new movie in over 30 years.

To put it short, Junk is junk - and the only thing it's good for was making my small DVD collection look a little bit bigger.

Rating:
Summary: Much better than expected
Review: I had pretty low expectations of this film before watching it. Rarely is Junk mentioned in the same class and given the same amount of admiration as Wild Zero or Versus, other recent Japanese Zombie films. Junk was released prior to the aforementioned two other films and spearheaded the new wave of Japanese zombie films of the new millennia. I was expecting this film to be cheap-looking and boring but instead Junk turned out to be a wildly fun and inventive stab at the zombie genre.

3 men and a woman agree to pull a heist on behalf of the Yakuza by robbing a jewellery store. In exchange for the jewellery the yakuza promise a hefty sum of cash. The meeting point is set at a remote former military site about an hour's drive outside of town. The robbers arrive at the base and while waiting for the Yakuza walk around and find out that it may not be as deserted as they originally thought, as they stumble upon a lab containing various chemicals and a room containing a number of bodies lying on the floor, wrapped in white sheets. Unbeknownst to them, the military base has for some time been the site of a project by the name of DNX that has as a goal of bringing back the dead to life. As the dead rise, the robbers and the Yakuza's struggle to stay alive begins.

Junk borrows elements from so many other zombie films that it's hard to keep a track of, the most obvious influences in particular being Fulci's Zombie, Re-animator and Return of the living dead. The zombies bear a striking resemblance to Romero's, with their bluish skin and slow limping shuffle. They die the exactly the same way, through a gunshot wound to the head. In other ways however, the film is quite unique within the zombie genre, a combination undead film and high-octane Asian action shoot-em-up. Zombies and the Yakuza make for an entertaining mix. I also liked the idea of a "head zombie", who is not dumb like the others but instead acts as a brain for all of the undead, able to de-activate bombs and outsmart the U.S. military. This head zombie is not a ghoul of rotting flesh like the others but a beautiful clear-skinned Japanese woman who spends most of her time prancing around naked on screen and taunting her former husband, the scientist behind the DNX project who brought her back to life. Most entertaining of all is a battle between the head zombie and the female robber, a climactic show-down between two beautiful asian women with scores to settle.

The action is unrelenting in this film, a stable of Asian cinema. Junk doesn't overstay its welcome the way the 120-minute Versus does, instead delivering a brisk 83-minute package of gun-toting gangster action and zombie gore. Highly underrated but highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Much better than expected
Review: I had pretty low expectations of this film before watching it. Rarely is Junk mentioned in the same class and given the same amount of admiration as Wild Zero or Versus, other recent Japanese Zombie films. Junk was released prior to the aforementioned two other films and spearheaded the new wave of Japanese zombie films of the new millennia. I was expecting this film to be cheap-looking and boring but instead Junk turned out to be a wildly fun and inventive stab at the zombie genre.

3 men and a woman agree to pull a heist on behalf of the Yakuza by robbing a jewellery store. In exchange for the jewellery the yakuza promise a hefty sum of cash. The meeting point is set at a remote former military site about an hour's drive outside of town. The robbers arrive at the base and while waiting for the Yakuza walk around and find out that it may not be as deserted as they originally thought, as they stumble upon a lab containing various chemicals and a room containing a number of bodies lying on the floor, wrapped in white sheets. Unbeknownst to them, the military base has for some time been the site of a project by the name of DNX that has as a goal of bringing back the dead to life. As the dead rise, the robbers and the Yakuza's struggle to stay alive begins.

Junk borrows elements from so many other zombie films that it's hard to keep a track of, the most obvious influences in particular being Fulci's Zombie, Re-animator and Return of the living dead. The zombies bear a striking resemblance to Romero's, with their bluish skin and slow limping shuffle. They die the exactly the same way, through a gunshot wound to the head. In other ways however, the film is quite unique within the zombie genre, a combination undead film and high-octane Asian action shoot-em-up. Zombies and the Yakuza make for an entertaining mix. I also liked the idea of a "head zombie", who is not dumb like the others but instead acts as a brain for all of the undead, able to de-activate bombs and outsmart the U.S. military. This head zombie is not a ghoul of rotting flesh like the others but a beautiful clear-skinned Japanese woman who spends most of her time prancing around naked on screen and taunting her former husband, the scientist behind the DNX project who brought her back to life. Most entertaining of all is a battle between the head zombie and the female robber, a climactic show-down between two beautiful asian women with scores to settle.

The action is unrelenting in this film, a stable of Asian cinema. Junk doesn't overstay its welcome the way the 120-minute Versus does, instead delivering a brisk 83-minute package of gun-toting gangster action and zombie gore. Highly underrated but highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: I liked this movie better when it was called Zombi 2!
Review: I saw this movie about a year ago and could not believe how terrible it was. For those of you you have seen Fulci's Zombie Flesh Eaters you will no doubt experience deja vu. I actually predicted what shot's were going to come next and hadn't even seen the movie. There are scenes that are literally shot by shot recreations of Fulci's. This movie was so terrible it made me want to kick myself in the face for watching it. It's a good thing i didn't pay to rent it or i might have commited suicide.

Rating:
Summary: Silly Eric Deitrich
Review: I'm not sure what you have against Japanese culture, but at least one of your accusations struck me as particularly funny. Quentin Tarantino's favorite movies (and books) are all japanese. In fact, he is great friends with several of Japan's contemporary filmmakers, such as the minds behind the hit "Battle Royale". Japan is actually one of HIS biggest influences. He is not a pioneer when it comes to blood and guts, to be sure, but even his episodic structure and ""pulp fiction style have been seen before. That said, I love tarantino. I think he's up there with raimi and burton. Sorry that i took up all that space with that explanation. In other news, you should find a copy of Junk on DVD and watch it. Give it a try, japanese zombies rock. But I prefer Versus.

Rating:
Summary: Silly Eric Deitrich
Review: I'm not sure what you have against Japanese culture, but at least one of your accusations struck me as particularly funny. Quentin Tarantino's favorite movies (and books) are all japanese. In fact, he is great friends with several of Japan's contemporary filmmakers, such as the minds behind the hit "Battle Royale". Japan is actually one of HIS biggest influences. He is not a pioneer when it comes to blood and guts, to be sure, but even his episodic structure and ""pulp fiction style have been seen before. That said, I love tarantino. I think he's up there with raimi and burton. Sorry that i took up all that space with that explanation. In other news, you should find a copy of Junk on DVD and watch it. Give it a try, japanese zombies rock. But I prefer Versus.

Rating:
Summary: CHILLING! DISTURBING! AWESOME!
Review: It's difficult to put a fresh spin on zombie flicks these days, but this is one film that is refreshingly shocking. Start the premise with young punks heisting jewels, and meeting with Yakuza hotshots at an abandoned military base to sell their wares. As the deal begins to go awry, this sounds like the beginnings of a hot "young punks vs murderous gangster" flick. Yeah, we've seen this plot over and over, but these thugs about to take part in a gangland war are unaware that the military base is not THOROUGHLY abandoned. Experiments in reanimation have been in the works, and these sleeping corpses would like to feast on do-gooders or evil-doers, whoever is nearest to their slothlike chompers.

The blood and guts are plentiful. Nothing overly impressive in the way of special effects, but the zombies' body movements and "chew factor" are unusually creepy. I've seen so many zombie flicks that try to scare you with graphic gore, but few that deliver genuinely scary sequences and intriguing characters.

If you love zombie flicks, this is a MUST! If you are a rookie Zombie Watcher, this flick might just get you wanting to feast on more "Living Dead" spectaculars!

Rating:
Summary: JUNK RULES! GET IT NOW!!!!
Review: Movie starts when some scientist's revive a Asian chick and she eats them. Then it goes to where some gangstaz hold up a jewelry store and steal jewelry then they go to an abandoned factory to meet with a Japanese mafia gang. Then they have a hissy fit with each other then zombies appear. And the only two survivors in the zombie factory is a blond dude and another Asian chick. Then two operatives are sent to investigate the situation and one of the dudes finds out his girlfriend is a all powerful zombie and she kills him. Now the other two survivors must now battle zombies and all that.

If you like Lucio's ZOMBI 3 (the music is so simular as well as the zombies), then you are in a for a treat. The funniest thing in this movie is when the scientist Asian guy is speaking English, badly. So bad I'd understand the Asian language better. This is a lovely, happy, gory film :). With a desent plot, and two of the hottest Asian women i have ever seen, this movie will surely please you.

Rating:
Summary: GREAT ZOMBIE FLICK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: this is by far one of the most underrated zombie films of all time!!!!i loved it & if your a true zombie fan you will love it to. filled with tons of FUN just like "RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD" JUNK is not to be missed by any true zombie fan!!!!!!! hurry up & get this bad azz zombie flick!!!!!!! later on fellow horror fans! & E!!!N!!!J!!!O!!!Y!!!

Rating:
Summary: It was certainly `Junk', I'll give you that.
Review: Throughout the late 18th century a grand Japanese-fever swept the regrettably not vaccinated western nations like a swarm of African killer bees from Irvin Allen's archetypal classic of the same name, leading, among other things, to myriad French impressionist art works and Gilbert and Sullivan's `The Mikado', which is for all intents and purposes about as Japanese as Shepard's pie - and for that we shall be forever be indebted to Mr. Gilbert's and Mr. Sullivan. Now, with many of the Japanese's recent imports, the unabashed scrounging of the other culture's art technique has come full circle. So enthralled are the pitiable, deluded fools by our lowest common denominator pop culture orts that they expend large amounts of their time and energy on plagarizing what is already watered down Tarantino, Romero, and Zimmer, by which I mean that this movie has in fact more in common with Paul Anderson's awful adaptation of the `Resident Evil' games, in themselves a tribute to Romero's classic `Living Dead' trilogy, Roger Avary's almost equally awful `Killing Zoe', needless to say a very second-rate imitation of `Reservoir Dogs', and the musical excretion of Klaus `The Uncomposer' Badelt, who has become rich and famous by simply imitating his only slightly superior and in general grossly overrated mentor Hans Zimmer.

The fundamentals that make up this movie's meager `plot' are recognizably familiar: The Avarian bank heist, the bickering gangsters, the Yakuza double-cross, the James Whalian ersatz-Frankenstein who crosses a line man was not meant to cross in order to reanimate his beloved dead wife, the Bay-esque macho military men with their Sam Elliot moustaches and Manuel Noriega-like skin, as well as the hilarity and wackiness that ensues when these forces clash. However, the imitation is not of a very high caliber, lacking the flaire and technical skill of a Tod Browning, a Romero or even, and this is particularly embarrassing, a Michael Bay or Roger Avary (I suggest the people responsible, especially the director, graciously commit harikari immediatly). Even without understanding a word of Japanese, the overacting and awkward, at times even idiotic, scripting is painfully obvious, as is the film's complete lack of original or memorable visuals. The pseudo-Badelt score is possibly the film's worst single aspect, full of hyperkinetic, depth-free, poorly synth-orchestrated, ultra-simplistic power-anthems of such a monumentally turbid, desiccated lifelessness that even if it fell off a junk, in this case not referring to the movie but to a Chinese flatbottom ship with a high poop and battened sails, it wouldn't be capable of rehydration.

Still, one does have to give credit to any movie that has the guts to call itself `Junk'.