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i must have seen a different film!!

Excellent but underrated film

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Viewed on DVD. Sound-track rock = four (4) stars; subtitles/translations = three (3) stars; scenario = two (2) stars; cinematography/editing = one (1) star. Director Gakuryû Ishii has foisted on movie audiences a low-budget TV-style music video consisting of unrelenting, meaningless (and repetitious) violence. This plot-less, overly-long, eye sore starts with some okay rock music which dissipates as the film moves along (thereby losing the movie's excuse to continue!). Ishii drums up a future Tokyo where streets are always filled with rock concert riots and gang warfare at night. Sometimes the police and, of course, Yakuza join in the rampage. "Acting" consists of mugging and shouting. Rock-music "score" is pretty good. Exterior sets (city dumps and abandoned industrial buildings) are strikingly original. Interior sets pretty much look the same because they likely are. Subtitles (which can not be turned off) capture about half of the song lyrics and dialog. Both translated dialog and lyrics appear in white at screen bottom with lyric text italicized. (Use of two colors would have prevented confusion as to what was what.) Signs are not translated. Cinematography (semi-wide screen, color) and editing quality is what one might expect from precocious children of five using their cell phone cameras! Shots (using super jerky hand-held cameras) are mostly monotonously limited to: out-of-focus somethings; repeats of accelerated street-level scenes from motor cycles; and in-your-face close ups of "actors." Wear lines turn up occasionally. Just turn off the video garbage and enjoy the punk rock bands on the sound track! WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.

The premise of the story is vague and there seems to be a couple different plot lines. First, a pimp and one of his girls are trying to get out of the slums. He pimps her out to a crime boss whose into S&M. That boss and his syndicate are trying to destroy the slums in a crooked construction scheme. For labor, the syndicate enslaves the city's population of mentally disabled homeless. Meanwhile, two rival gangs/bands drag race, fight, and crash each other's gigs to dominate the punk rock scene. The rivals are also fighting against the police because, well, you know, it's the police.Burst City uses a lot of shaky hand-held camera-work. Not because they were going for some aesthetic effect but because it's cheap. In much the same way, there is an overall lack of lighting. Burst City jumps between plot lines and characters spending little time establishing either. The combination results in a movie that has the potential to be very confusing, if not incoherent.In all honesty, I've seen this one and a half times. A few years ago, I attempted to watch it but I was too sleepy. I couldn't concentrate. This time I watched it on a flight from Baton Rouge to Lincoln. Unfortunately, I was a little sleepy this time too. I zoned out for just a minute and when I zoned back in, some character (I didn't know who) was killed (somehow) by someone (probably the syndicate) and, in response, the two rival gangs started fighting each other. The character was never mentioned again so I don't think it was that important."80's Japanese Sci-fi Punk Rock Musical, need I say more?" I wanted that to be my bottom line but I thought it might be a little misleading. Sometimes it can be fun to get together with some friends, get some pizza, and put on a low budget movie. But when you do that, you ought to choose a movie that is easy to watch. After all, the focus is hanging out with friends. This won't work if you try it with Burst City. It may just be a little too much to simply throw on the TV. That said, I give it a 4.5/5 because of its spirit.From what I've read, Burst City was created by a couple punk bands who wanted to put out a movie featuring their music. The film's potential shortcomings are necessary evils when you consider this motivation. They didn't have the budget for smooth sophisticated cinematography or lighting but so what? They wanted to make a movie and they did it. It also helps that the music is awesome.After watching this movie, I got into a punk rock mood so I re-watched the big budget, mainstream, Brass Knuckle Boys which is about a punk band from the 80's reuniting and rediscovering punk. Speaking of Brass Knuckle Boys, looking over my posts, it seems I never wrote a review about it. I will post that soon as well. Anyway, I am working on a post the compares and contrasts the depiction of punk rock in Burst City and Brass Knuckle Boys. In the meantime, I would recommend Burst City particularly if you are a fan of punk rock; it is a cool movie.

I have seen a lot of Japanese Movies, and this must have been one of the worst i have seen in all those years. The Punk Music might be appealing to some people, but the rest of the film is awful. The so called Camera-work looks like they just ran around with the Cam, the "violent" scenes some People liked are cut fast and filmed with an extremely unsteady Camera so you don't see anything at all. Weird Gangs fighting each other makes it looks like an extremely cheap "The Riffs" aka "Bronx Warriors" RipOff, which was originally released 1982 as well. All in all the movie just was a mix of pointless and bad fights, mixed with punk music... Even for a giant Musicvideo the Visuals are extremely bad. Don't let yourself fool you by People how compare this to work by Miike or Kitano, because even their worst movies look like Oscar-winners compared to this waste of material.

A shame few will get the chance to see this movie. It was suggested to me as a Japanese Death Race 2000. Oh, but it is so much more. A dystopian future against a backdrop of angry Japanese punk rock. Burst City is a raw look at an overamped society with its frantic, hyper camera work and loud brash music. As a fictional peek into punk rock, Burst City is still leaps and bounds above any other attempts. Well worth the look. Be prepared to search, however, and I don't believe there is a subtitled or dubbed version in existence. This is a shame as the film deserves greater exposure.