In a similar vain to Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange, Kinji Fukasaku's Battle Royale is an excessive piece of filmmaking from Japan. Based on the novel by Koshun Takami, this is a society where unruly school kids have pushed their mentors to the limit and, as a result, the government has set up an extreme method of punishment to tell the children of their country that life isn't a game.

After a rather undeveloped opening sequence in a school, 43 classmates are drugged and wake up on an island, where they find they have been fitted with dog collars that monitor their every move. They are then shown an MTV-style video by their old teacher ('Beat' Takeshi Kitano), explaining the rules of the new game.

They have been chosen by lottery to fight each other in a three-day, no-holds-barred contest, called Battle Royale. There can only be one survivor and therefore classmates must turn on each other with the use of various weapons, from a pot lid to a machine gun. If there is more than one still alive at the end, their collars will detonate automatically, giving the contenders an even stronger motive to kill and survive.

With its soundtrack of classical music, you cannot help but feel that you are standing next to Coppola, along with helicopters and some of the intense explosive imagery. But Fukasaku's film attempts to be layered, as it highlights an authority desperate to clamp down on law and order. There is an alienation between the pupils and their elders, who, at times, do not understand themselves, let alone each other, which is kind of how you feel as a viewer. Intentional? I'll let you decide.

There is little character development, due to the amount of kids on the island. All the main players have distinctive backgrounds, however. Shuya is the quiet and sensitive one, who ends up being fostered after his father hangs himself. Noriko is a sweet and innocent girl, whom Shuya protects throughout the film. Then there is Kawada, one of the transfer pupils, a mysterious rogue who may hold the key to getting them off alive. Kitano, as the teacher, is short on words and high on presence, hated not only by his pupils, but even by his own children.

Beautifully shot, although hard to watch, this is a film that packs a powerful punch. The social commentary is somewhat hidden amongst fast-paced violence, which I feel is the main reason a generation brought up on John Woo and computer games will appreciate.

Cult viewing with a capital C.