Dead or Alive (The Last Drive-In)

Film Year:  1999
Genre:  Action
Director:  Takashi Miike
Starring:  Riki Takeuchi, Show Aikawa, Renji Ishibashi

The Movie

Well...I guess I have to write something about this movie now...

I mostly sat through Dead or Alive in a stupor, trying to make heads or tails of it (Joe Bob tried to warn me, why didn't I listen?), so if my details aren't up to speed, I apologize.  This movie was something.  Dead or Alive (not to be confused with the video game series) is about a war between the Triads and the Yakuza on Japanese turf, while a detective attempts to bring them both down.

There's a lot of crazy shit that happens in between, though trying to refresh my memory with what is and what isn't relevant proves to be a challenge.  Looking up synopses for the film is fruitless, because it seems like most who write them scale it down to bare basics because the film has a habit of tangents into wackiness and violence.  But if I were to ever find a detailed outline of this movie, I can't promise that my eyes wouldn't glaze over while reading it as much as they did while watching it.  Most of what I can definitively state is that I watched a bunch of people get gunned down, Asian strippers straddling poles, a hooker get drowned in a wading pool full of poo (no, seriously), a dude tearing his own arm off then pulling a rocket launcher out of his ass, and some total DragonBall bullshit in that climax.

When the movie tries to have a story, it can be interesting if a little meandering.  The story feels sturdy, though I didn't feel the drama was particularly strong.  It seemed like it was relying too much on its style to sell itself, which can be a blessing for some viewers, though a bit tiresome for others.  The movie does offer a few shock turns and expectation-defying sequences that either are Tarantino-inspired or have inspired Tarantino (or maybe a little bit of both).  By the end the point becomes clear to me that Dead or Alive is purely a style and skill over substance movie.

Dead or Alive was directed by Takashi Miike, a popular Japanese director that I have limited knowledge of.  I've seen his film Audition, which is more coherent than this movie, but just as fucked up.  Other than that, I've heard titles linked with his name, but I know little about them.  If Dead or Alive and Audition are an example of a surreal and extremist style that I should expect, I'm not sure I want to go down that road.

I'm not entirely sure how you can follow up a movie that ends with (spoiler alert I guess) Japan blowing up in a way that would make Godzilla jealous, but for some reason there are two sequels to this movie.  Apparently they do little more than share a title with it, and have no connection to the storyline, though Takashi Miike returns to direct and they also star Riki Takeuchi and Show Aikawa.  Dare I even try?

The Drive-In

Joe Bob is going Japanese, I really think so!  Dead or Alive is a bit of a curveball in this Dinners of Death marathon, which has been dominated by a pair of cannibal films up until this point, but now we're faced with a borderline nonsensical, subtitled Japanese gang film.  The big "dinner of death" selling point comes as the film transitions into the third act, where a dinner scene turns into a full massacre, with the majority of guests riddled with bullets.

Like myself, Joe Bob doesn't understand this movie, but at the very least he seems fascinated by it, which is good for us because that means talking points, particularly about the director and its stars (Joe Bob would like to make clear he's hetero, but if he batted for the other team...Riki Takeuchi).  However, he doesn't seem to have as much info on this film as he did for his previous two films, so we see much less of Joe Bob during this film.  When he does appear, he's usually questioning something in the film and asking "What the hell was that?"

The drowning in feces scene by itself really gets under Joe Bob's skin, which is understandable, though he questions why a man's impotence would lead to such a thing.  This leads to the big guest bit on the episode, a phone call with Felissa Rose from Sleepaway Camp, now the show's "Mangled Dick Expert," to ask if that justifies killing a woman with her own shit.  This is the first of many guest spots for Felissa (unless she guested in any of the episodes that were pulled from the first marathon that I never got to), and as far as I'm concerned, she is welcome for any Last Drive-In episode.

Some of my favorite moments in the episode came out of tangents Joe Bob makes that have nothing to do with the movie.  His discussion of how blackface is common in Asian cosplay made me laugh because of its cultural divide in what is deemed offensive.  I liked how Joe Bob uses Godzilla as a benchmark in normal Japanese cinema, then rants about the difference between American monsters and Japanese monsters (Joe Bob claims nobody cares about King Kong in Japan, this is actually false.  Kong's popularity helped inspire Godzilla, but I'm certain Joe Bob is joking, so I'll allow it).  The episode concludes with a continuation of an argument from the previous episode, where Darcy tries to convince Joe Bob that ThanksKilling is a Thanksgiving themed horror movie.  Joe Bob argues that ThanksKilling is actually a short film, since it doesn't hit 80 minutes, though Darcy looks up the consideration for feature film length, which go down all the way to 40 minutes.  While what Darcy states is actually a very old established guildline, technically it's still correct to this day, so Darcy wins.

Dead or Alive features some pretty good Joe Bob reactions and trivia, though I was left a little exhausted by the movie.  I found myself waiting for Joe Bob more and more often, and while I usually have that feeling about wanting more Joe Bob, sometimes the best Joe Bob experiences are when you're also invested in the movie he's showing.  Dead or Alive didn't quite do that for me, though it's perfectly weird and interesting enough to share with this audience.

Joe Bob's Rating
⭐⭐⭐