DVD Clinic

Awfully Good #96
October 14, 2009

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Source: DVD Clinic

By: Jason Adams

The Machine Girl (2008)

Director: Noboru Iguchi
Stars: Minase Yashiro, Asami, Kentaro Shimazu

Is there a plot?

After her younger brother is killed by teenage Yakuza bullies, a one-armed Japanese girl replaces her missing limb with a machine gun and vows sweet, sweet revenge.

What's the damage?

I could probably do this entire column every week just using bizarre and over the top Japanese movies. There’s something about that country that when given the chance, sees their repressed culture express themselves with some seriously ridiculous and crazy shit. How else do you explain soft spoken housewives tempura frying a teenage girl, or a chef being forced to eat his own fingers as some new wave sushi, or a lady getting stabbed in the throat and vomiting her intestines onto her dismembered son’s head. This is the work of some truly sick people. This is MACHINE GIRL.

That pesky Ark of the Covenant keeps showing up in the darndest places.

Brutal gore is nothing new to cinema, especially the films of Asia. I am well versed in all things Miike, but MACHINE GIRL is a much different animal. (I feel like as soon as you add in schoolgirls and cyborg assassins, you open yourself up to being more of a cartoonish comedy.) If anything, this movie is more akin to the unreal bloodshed found in Awfully Good favorite RIKI-OH: THE STORY OF RICKY. But there are things in MACHINE GIRL that makes RICKY look like HOWARD’S END. Director Noboru Iguchi, who interestingly got his start making porn movies with names like YOUNGER SISTER REALLY LEWD SPEECH PERSECUTION, does a nice job finding new and creative ways for showing you what the inside of a human being looks like. So much arterial blood is shed throughout this movie that it makes the Red Cross horny. And then the chainsaw comes out.

Things Not To Do With Ninja Stars #67: Eat them.

It’s a pretty simple plot really; just your basic revenge story. When she straps on the machine gun, it may send shivers of EVIL DEAD II or PLANET TERROR down your spine, but I feel there’s still enough love in Weapon-As-Limb genre to go around. And although a good chunk of the movie is set up explaining how the girl becomes machine, there’s nary a boring moment where somebody’s personal space isn’t getting torn asunder. The filmmakers pad out the non-violent moments with so much bizarre wackiness that you almost forget about assassin schoolgirls. Most of that comes from the sociopathic Yakuza family that drives the plot along, murdering countless people along the way and drinking each other’s blood. There are also other random strokes of genius like a trio of Junior High Ninjas, or a group of grieving parents turned killers who call themselves The Super Mourner Gang. I also love when the bad guy makes a shield out of three innocent children to protect himself from Machine Girl.

Asian Jello-O…not for sissies.

Enjoy the sampling of Best Parts below, though I can’t in good conscience show you the simultaneous glory/horror that is Drill Bra. I’m pretty sure there’s some human rights statute protecting you from that.

Rob was having second thoughts about his last minute decision to go as Pinhead for Halloween.