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Scrap Heaven (Unrated)





Release Date: June 18th, 2007 (Two Boots Pioneer Theater) by Media Blasters.
The Cast: Ryo Kase, Jô Odagiri, Chiaki Kuriyama, Akira Emoto, Akira Shoji, Takama Suzuki.
Directed by Sang-il Lee.
In Japanese with subtitles.

BASIC PREMISE: Shingo (Kase), a police station clerk, Tetsu (Odagiri), a sanitation worker, and Saki (Kuriyama), a pharmacist, become deranged after survive a bus hijacking together.

ENTERTAINMENT VALUE: Scrap Heaven has imaginative characters in an uneven yet lively plot which includes scraps of comedy, revenge thriller and drama. Shingo, Tetsu and Saki all meet during a bus hijacking when Tetsu gets injured, although they all come out of it alive. Three years later, Testu approaches Shingo and convincing him to start a deranged revenge-for-hire business from a restroom. They eventually run into Saki, who has a fetish for experimenting with explosive chemicals. Boy do they all need a lot of therapy! The revenge scenes are quite a lot of sick, twisted fun, such as when Shingo injects lots of Viagra into a business man who they tied up in his office. Ryo Kase, Jô Odagiri and Chiaki Kuriyama give lively performances and enjoy their roles, which they display onscreen with their offbeat comic energy. Writer/director Sang-il Lee awkwardly combines drama and comedy, some of which includes juvenile toilet humor. All three characters seem quite odd in their own idiosyncratic ways, especially Shingo with his irritable bowel. While the comedy works overall, the dramatic shift within the second act feels contrived and makes the plot lose much of its exciting momentum which propelled it during the prior scenes. Lee should have focused on the comedic aspects of the plot and stuck to it throughout. At a running time of 117 minutes, Scrap Heaven slightly overstays its welcome.

SPIRITUAL VALUE: None is required or desired.

INSULT TO YOUR INTELLIGENCE: None, as long as you suspend your disbelief.

NUMBER OF TIMES I CHECKED MY WATCH: 3

IN A NUTSHELL: Lively and offbeat with imaginative characters, but the uneven plot eventually loses its momentum.

RECOMMENDED WAY TO WATCH: DVD


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