Versus (2000)

Down to Hell 2
The Ultimate Versus

Cast:

Tak Sakaguchi is Prisoner KSC2-303
Hideo Sakaki is The Man
Chieko Misaka is The Girl
Kenji Matsuda is Yakuza Leader with butterfly knife
Yuichiro Arai is Motorcycle-riding yakuza with revolver
Minoru Matsumoto is Crazy yakuza with amulet

What the box says:

Total gross-out splatterfest from Japan, scaling new heights in ultragore!! Samurai Warriors, Zombies, Mystics, Zombies, Enchanted Forests, aliens, Zombies, Yakuza, gore, violence, etc... Totally uncut!! A deliorusly inventive splatterfest coupling the visual artistry of John Woo and the gory aesthics of George Romero, Versus is something like a movie that Sam Raimi might have produced. If he was Japanese. And didn't have to worry about rating certificates. Or unlimited supplies of blood squibs, heavy artillery, samurai swords, and fake prosethic limbs. In terms of action and plot, this is one of the most enjoyable outrageous movies you will ever witness.

Plot:

In Japan is the 444th portal in the Forest of Resurrection. Hundreds of years ago, a samurai has to battle zombies. He charges at some evil-looking priest who quickly dispatches him.

Present day, 2 prisoners escape from a couple of cops. Prisoner KSC and Other Guy head to be picked up by the yakuza. KSC is wondering why the yakuza would bust him out of prison. The goons are ordered by their boss who will catch up with them shortly. The supremely cool KSC spots that the goons have a Girl with them. He keeps provoking the goons until he gets ahold of the Girl and a gun. He shoots one of the goons.

This is some John Woo movie, isn't it? Things are starting to look like a gun-fu Mexican standoff until the dead guy sits up. That act promptly gets everyone to shooting the zombie.

Noibody seems that disturbed by the fact of anyone getting up after dying. Another goon shoots the Prisoner Other Guy who sits up. He gets shot down.

KSC and the Girl get off into the forest. The goons start chasing him. KSC finds a couple of dead guys and is able to ditch his prison jumpsuit for a black leather duster and other ultra-cool clothes.

One of the goons realizes this forest is where they have dumped their victims. He gets pretty crazy when he sees piles of unemptied graves. If zombies roaming the forest isn't bad enough, these zombies are still able to use guns. Yes, the Yakuza zersus gun-wielding zombies.

Who says only in Chinese movies are the fights in the forests?

In the confusion, the Girl gets separated from KSC who goes after her. The head goon kills one for wanting to follow the orders the boss gave them.

The Girl can't remember anything before being taken into the forest. KSC can't remember much either.

The Boss arrives. It's the evil priest from the very beginning of the movie (let's just call him Hideo). The head goon decides to make a hostile takeover by gunning down Hideo who gets up but not like the zombies. The Girl sees this and wants to get away. She remembers Hideo.

The cops the prisoners escaped from are determined to retrieve them. While searching, they manage to randomly gun some guy to take his car and are starting to carmageddon nayone on the road.

Hole in the head, ought to be impressive to Scanners

Hideo reanimates all the goons

Apparently, the Girl remembers more than KSC does. She knows that he and Hideo are destined to fight. She tries explaining that this is the forest of Resurrection.

Hideo explains that he needs the Girl for her blood to power him. Apparently, the forest of Resurrection can do more than resurrect people it can open the portal to the other side. KSC isn't able to outfight Hideo like everyone else so far. Hideo has been waiting for the girl to reincarnate for the past 500 years. He offers to let KSC join his side. He turns him down and is killed by Hideo.

The Girl runs off and finds KSC. She cuts herself to resurrect KSC. Cut to a flashback, Samurai KSC and the Girl are surrounded by zombies. He kills the Girl so Hideo can't get her. KSC finishes off the zombie goons, but Hideo dispatches him.

Present day, KSC is brought back to life and he's not very happy.

Hideo prepares to sacrifice the Girl to open the portal to gain his power. He realizes that she's used her blood to reanimate KSC. Apparently, her blood wasn't powerful enough. Hideo's plan was for the Girl to resurrect KSC who's blood is strong enough to the true resurrection key.

As KSC has to handle the zombie Yakuza, Hideo readies his sword. Get ready for the final battle with swords, pistols, etc...Hideo manages to stab KSC but he's able to catch the deathblow. Sweet, sweet slo-mo sword fighting as Hideo gets decapitated.

KSC and the Girl ready to leave the forest. They're not sure what will happen to KSC when he leaves the forest since he's been resurrected. Cut to 99 years in the future where the city looks more like the post-apocalyptic era...

The hero is searching and finds the Girl being held captive. However, the hero is Hideo. Girl mentions that she should have been on Hideo's side. KSC is the villain who wants Hideo to take him to the other side of the portal to destroy everything else. They draw their swords, and it ends.

What I say:

I've had this movie for about 7 years before actually getting around to it for review. Unfortunately, that means I haven't seen the Ultimate version that is more than 30 minutes longer. Why have I gotten around to finally reviewing it? This is a milestone. Number 400...Yes...400 reviews that possibly have wasted so much time from any of my ten of fans.

With what was on the back of the box, you couldn't expect anything that made any sense. I still haven't found any aliens in this movie. Resurrection, reincarnation, zombies, samurai, yakuza. It does seem to be everything but the kitchen sink or ninjas. We can't have everything...However, a movie that starts off with a katana-wielding samurai fighting zombies means your in for something special.

Definitely can see the John Woo gun-fu bits along with Bad Taste and Dead Alive with that amped up maniacal feeling. It's more than just that. What do you get when you cross Matrix and Blade action scenes, Spaghetti Westerns, with a dashing of Sam Raimi's Evil Dead 2, too? A movie that makes absolutely no sense for so-called normal people and revels in that fact.

The idea of the hero and villain having to fight in circles does seem a bit like HighLander but without the Queen soundtrack (Be honest enough to admit you were humming "Princes of the Universe") and sadly without the necessary numerous decapitations. Locked in battling over the centuries, with the ending that as a story makes less sense than me trying to explain calculus to 1st graders.

Guys mainly run around in a forest to fight each other and zombies. Think it's safe to say this won't be considered in the realm of deeply enriching cinema. They're fighting in a forest during day. Well, finally, a movie that didn't have anywhere in my notes: TDTS (Too Dark To See). Many of the low budget movies have scenes set without any lighting you'd almost expect Helen Keller to have been the lighting director for Ray Charles as the head camerman.

In the past decade, zombies have come far beyond the realm of George Romero and Return of the Living Dead. It's more than just movie adaptations of video games even with House of the Dead and Resident Evil and its sequels.

Many low budget movies are typically done by directors that see themselves as if they're the next coming of Ingmar Bergman when they should hope to be the reanimation of Uwe Boll. I've not seen many Japanese movies besides a few Godzilla movies and some of the animes. The director, Ryûhei Kitamura, who also wrote the story may be more known for directing a bit more famous movie: Godzila: Final Wars.

Versus doesn't take itself too seriously. Plenty of movies have the action star doing the ultra-cool action scene that oozes extreme-cool. The scene where the Prisoner is about to put on the sunglasses, and the Girl just gives him the look that he isn't that cool. It's a scene hard to explain defintely a scene where the image is worth a 1,000 words.

Quotable Subtitles
"Besides, this place gives me the creeps."
"Here's the thing, I'm a feminist..."
"They were...surely dead..."
"I grew up in Yellow Stone National Park, a born hunter..."
"A scumbag , you should be dead."
"Don't call me, officer..."
"Smell? Like a dog breeder..."
"You can't hit me! I have 500 times faster reflexes then Mike Tyson!"
Morals of the Story
Wielding a katantsounds like cocking a gun.
Reanimated corpses don't disturb gun-wielding gangsters.
Human heads can be used as bullet-proof shields.
Severed heads are reguraly used as soccer balls.
Zombies constantly burrow into the ground.