REVIEW: Wild Zero (2000)
I'm on a quest.
It's the same quest that many others have embarked on, a noble and glorious tradition involving all people who are passionately in love with their hobbies: we are all brothers in the quest for the ever-elusive and mysterious hidden gem. We're all looking for that obscure movie or unknown album that will shake us and give us cause to think that we've discovered a new and undiscovered country, like pioneers of cinema and sound.
Okay, fine, that might be too majestic. Really, I'm just a Netflix junkie that watches a lot of shit, so it makes me really happy to find a movie that I've never heard of before that turns out to be more than halfway decent.
Up until about four days ago, I'd never even heard of Wild Zero, which blows my mind because while I may not be 100% up-to-date on all trashy horror films, I'm pretty close. I'd say high- nineties. I read the movie sites, listen to the internet chatter, and scan release dates like they might reveal prophecy. Still, I missed Wild Zero completely, and it was only by the fluke of having Netflix suggest it as a rental that I got it. Zombies and aliens, it said, and I took a chance. This movie is wild, and that's pretty much the only connection the title has to anything going on in the plot.
From the shores of Japan, director Tetsuro Takeuchi and lo-fi rock band Guitar Wolf bring us a silly tale of true love, zombies, and the power of rock and roll. The movie plops itself down in the relatively small genre of "Nonsense Comedies Built Around Bands," and I'll make the argument that it probably has more in common with the Beatles' flick Help! than it does with Dawn of the Dead. The movie is ninety minutes of musical madcap silliness, kept afloat by pure energy and adrenaline. The movie has so much fun with itself that it doesn't really hold to any genre rules; the editing is crappy, the plot doesn't make sense, and even the rules of zombiedom don't hold up internally -- but it doesn't matter, because it's pretty apparent that those qualities are of no importance to the filmmakers. What is important is that everyone has a good time, and that Guitar Wolf gets to rock.
Wild Zero's real lead character is Ace, a doofy teenager that idolizes Guitar Wolf with a zealousness that borders on cult behavior, evidenced by the glazed eyes he uses to stare at them in concert. He has a mile-high pompadour that he's constantly combing, and wears the true rock n' roll black leather biker jacket that Guitar Wolf, Bass Wolf, and Drum Wolf also sport. (Yes, the band Guitar Wolf is made up of Guitar Wolf, Bass Wolf, and Drum Wolf.) I guess one of the biggest joys of the movie is that I really liked the music; think the Ramones with bizarre mistranslated half-Japanese/half-English lyrics, and microphones that spit streams of fire when Guitar Wolf wails into them. Guitar Wolf was once promoted as the loudest band in the world, and are known to prize volume and the rock n' roll attitude as more important than talent; adjust your television volume accordingly.
After their latest gig, Guitar Wolf has a violent run-in with the club manager known as the Captain, a whore-abusing drug addict who wears really little shorts. Ace, of course, happens to be outside the room when the Captain says "Rock and roll is over!" and so bursts in to defend the sacred spirit of rocking, accidentally ending the Mexican stand-off inside. Guitar Wolf, in an act of thanks, makes Ace his blood brother in rock and roll, and gives him a magical whistle so he can call the band whenever he's in trouble. Yeah, it's that kind of movie. Turns out that Ace might need that whistle pretty soon, since an alien attack on Earth (by thousands of tiny spinning saucers straight out of the 1950s) causes the people of Japan to turn into flesh-eating zombies.
Elsewhere in the story, three petty criminals try to rob a gas station, only to be accidentally foiled by Ace's door-opening skills. In the aftermath, our hero meets a girl named Tobio (and we know it's instant love thanks to the red hearts that appear around their heads), but leaves his love unrequited so he can make it to the next Guitar Wolf show. There's also a bunch of arms dealers and Yakuza types that turn into zombie fodder pretty quick, and when Ace comes across that roadside flesh feast, a vision of Guitar Wolf instructs him that if he really loves Tobio, he'll go back for her. A little later on, a dark secret about Tobio is revealed to Ace's screaming disgust, but Guitar Wolf reminds him that true love, like rock n' roll, doesn't recognize boundaries, nationalities, or genders.
There is blood-a-plenty in this flick, and enough gore to keep all the genre fans pleased. Guitar Wolf turns out to be the most badass band in all of Japan, killing zombies by the boatload with magical electric guitar picks and their super-heroic ability to be awesomely cool. Guitar Wolf himself is so hardcore that he takes out the alien mothership with a ninja sword that he keeps inside his guitar; heck, he even blows up Bass Wolf and Drum Wolf for no apparent reason, although they're also so rock that they show up in the next scene with not a scratch on them. We get a bunch of live concert footage, lots of soundtrack, plenty of comedy, and more fun than us jaded horror watchers probably deserve.
I've heard on other websites that Wild Zero is almost beyond reviewing, but I think that I can say that it works, at least in the one way that it seems to want to succeed in: being entertaining. I'd guess that most movies want to be entertaining, but most movies also want to be other things like coherent, heartwarming, scary, and so forth, and when they fail at those things it takes away from the entertainment. Wild Zero has no such pretensions -- it's like a sugar-high circus clown that wants you to smile and will do whatever it takes, be it love stories or zombie attacks, to make you happy. It throws in so many great and silly things that even if you don't like the first thirty jokes, there's just bound to be a good one in the second thirty, and they'll play punk rock as a bridge to get to something that'll make you smile.
The best thing that I can tell you about this movie is that you should just let the rush of it all wash over you, and remember to treat it like it is: a testament to the lo-fi rockers in all of us. If rock n' roll is God, then Guitar Wolf is our savior.
Although I've only seen it once, this is one of my new favorite 'late night' movies, and just might be one of my favorite zombie flicks of all time.
Also included on the DVD is the Wild Zero drinking game, which flashes images of a beer mug on the screen whenever anyone takes a drink, does drugs, says "rock and roll," a zombie's head explodes, or something gets lit on fire. You could get drunk watching the DVD menu screen with these rules.
It's the same quest that many others have embarked on, a noble and glorious tradition involving all people who are passionately in love with their hobbies: we are all brothers in the quest for the ever-elusive and mysterious hidden gem. We're all looking for that obscure movie or unknown album that will shake us and give us cause to think that we've discovered a new and undiscovered country, like pioneers of cinema and sound.
Okay, fine, that might be too majestic. Really, I'm just a Netflix junkie that watches a lot of shit, so it makes me really happy to find a movie that I've never heard of before that turns out to be more than halfway decent.Up until about four days ago, I'd never even heard of Wild Zero, which blows my mind because while I may not be 100% up-to-date on all trashy horror films, I'm pretty close. I'd say high- nineties. I read the movie sites, listen to the internet chatter, and scan release dates like they might reveal prophecy. Still, I missed Wild Zero completely, and it was only by the fluke of having Netflix suggest it as a rental that I got it. Zombies and aliens, it said, and I took a chance. This movie is wild, and that's pretty much the only connection the title has to anything going on in the plot.
From the shores of Japan, director Tetsuro Takeuchi and lo-fi rock band Guitar Wolf bring us a silly tale of true love, zombies, and the power of rock and roll. The movie plops itself down in the relatively small genre of "Nonsense Comedies Built Around Bands," and I'll make the argument that it probably has more in common with the Beatles' flick Help! than it does with Dawn of the Dead. The movie is ninety minutes of musical madcap silliness, kept afloat by pure energy and adrenaline. The movie has so much fun with itself that it doesn't really hold to any genre rules; the editing is crappy, the plot doesn't make sense, and even the rules of zombiedom don't hold up internally -- but it doesn't matter, because it's pretty apparent that those qualities are of no importance to the filmmakers. What is important is that everyone has a good time, and that Guitar Wolf gets to rock.
Wild Zero's real lead character is Ace, a doofy teenager that idolizes Guitar Wolf with a zealousness that borders on cult behavior, evidenced by the glazed eyes he uses to stare at them in concert. He has a mile-high pompadour that he's constantly combing, and wears the true rock n' roll black leather biker jacket that Guitar Wolf, Bass Wolf, and Drum Wolf also sport. (Yes, the band Guitar Wolf is made up of Guitar Wolf, Bass Wolf, and Drum Wolf.) I guess one of the biggest joys of the movie is that I really liked the music; think the Ramones with bizarre mistranslated half-Japanese/half-English lyrics, and microphones that spit streams of fire when Guitar Wolf wails into them. Guitar Wolf was once promoted as the loudest band in the world, and are known to prize volume and the rock n' roll attitude as more important than talent; adjust your television volume accordingly.
After their latest gig, Guitar Wolf has a violent run-in with the club manager known as the Captain, a whore-abusing drug addict who wears really little shorts. Ace, of course, happens to be outside the room when the Captain says "Rock and roll is over!" and so bursts in to defend the sacred spirit of rocking, accidentally ending the Mexican stand-off inside. Guitar Wolf, in an act of thanks, makes Ace his blood brother in rock and roll, and gives him a magical whistle so he can call the band whenever he's in trouble. Yeah, it's that kind of movie. Turns out that Ace might need that whistle pretty soon, since an alien attack on Earth (by thousands of tiny spinning saucers straight out of the 1950s) causes the people of Japan to turn into flesh-eating zombies.
Elsewhere in the story, three petty criminals try to rob a gas station, only to be accidentally foiled by Ace's door-opening skills. In the aftermath, our hero meets a girl named Tobio (and we know it's instant love thanks to the red hearts that appear around their heads), but leaves his love unrequited so he can make it to the next Guitar Wolf show. There's also a bunch of arms dealers and Yakuza types that turn into zombie fodder pretty quick, and when Ace comes across that roadside flesh feast, a vision of Guitar Wolf instructs him that if he really loves Tobio, he'll go back for her. A little later on, a dark secret about Tobio is revealed to Ace's screaming disgust, but Guitar Wolf reminds him that true love, like rock n' roll, doesn't recognize boundaries, nationalities, or genders.There is blood-a-plenty in this flick, and enough gore to keep all the genre fans pleased. Guitar Wolf turns out to be the most badass band in all of Japan, killing zombies by the boatload with magical electric guitar picks and their super-heroic ability to be awesomely cool. Guitar Wolf himself is so hardcore that he takes out the alien mothership with a ninja sword that he keeps inside his guitar; heck, he even blows up Bass Wolf and Drum Wolf for no apparent reason, although they're also so rock that they show up in the next scene with not a scratch on them. We get a bunch of live concert footage, lots of soundtrack, plenty of comedy, and more fun than us jaded horror watchers probably deserve.
I've heard on other websites that Wild Zero is almost beyond reviewing, but I think that I can say that it works, at least in the one way that it seems to want to succeed in: being entertaining. I'd guess that most movies want to be entertaining, but most movies also want to be other things like coherent, heartwarming, scary, and so forth, and when they fail at those things it takes away from the entertainment. Wild Zero has no such pretensions -- it's like a sugar-high circus clown that wants you to smile and will do whatever it takes, be it love stories or zombie attacks, to make you happy. It throws in so many great and silly things that even if you don't like the first thirty jokes, there's just bound to be a good one in the second thirty, and they'll play punk rock as a bridge to get to something that'll make you smile.
The best thing that I can tell you about this movie is that you should just let the rush of it all wash over you, and remember to treat it like it is: a testament to the lo-fi rockers in all of us. If rock n' roll is God, then Guitar Wolf is our savior.
Although I've only seen it once, this is one of my new favorite 'late night' movies, and just might be one of my favorite zombie flicks of all time.
Also included on the DVD is the Wild Zero drinking game, which flashes images of a beer mug on the screen whenever anyone takes a drink, does drugs, says "rock and roll," a zombie's head explodes, or something gets lit on fire. You could get drunk watching the DVD menu screen with these rules.
sent by The Retropolitan at 12:41 PM
...1 RESPONDO-GRAMS:
love it
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