Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering a Japanese horror film from 2009. That movie is "Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl".
Now, I do know a couple of things about this movie. The first being that it's very similar to other Japanese gore films that I've seen such as "Tokyo Gore Police", for example. Speaking of which, I also know that one of the people who directed this movie also wrote the screenplay for it as well. The person who I'm referring to is Yoshihiro Nishimura. The same man who also directed other films such as "Tokyo Gore Police" and Mutant Girls Squad". Both movies I really enjoyed, and I'm hoping this one will also be of the exact same quality as those two movies. Also, and this is something I just found out recently, Nishimura unfortunately just passed away earlier this year. Which definitely came as a surprise to me, because I didn't even know about it until I did my small amount of research on this film.
So, while it's unfortunate that the man is no longer with us, I'm still going to go into this one hoping that it will be really good. But I won't know if it's actually any good unless I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl".
4 minutes later
You know, guys, it's been quite a long time since I last watched a Japanese splatter film, and this opening sequence here where blood's just gushing everywhere, especially from creative aspects like skulls from zombie girls, is definitely not shy in showing all of that early. This is certainly awesome. And also, this opening song here isn't too bad either. It's actually sorta catchy.
6 minutes later
You know, guys, in the time I've been to school, I've never experienced a "wrist cutting rally" before. And no, I'm not joking about that either, that's actually a thing in this movie, and my god, it is funny as hell.
5 minutes later
Oh my god...okay, I wasn't gonna comment on this until later, but there's a club known as "Super Dark Girls Club", and there's literally a group of 4 people dressed in blackface and also are wearing outfits that you'd probably imagine what black girls wear, including their hairstyles. I know it's offensive as hell, but shit, this is fucking hilarious, man! I love it.
10 minutes later
You know, guys, it's not often I see a kabuki scientist and a sexy nurse working together to reanimate corpses ala Frankenstein. And the way they're doing it is, well, interesting to say the least. It's very flashy, very odd, but then again, I probably wouldn't expect less from a Japanese film that usually tends to be wacky and creative. And it's definitely both here, I'll say that much.
1 minute later
OK, um...well, it's certainly a fine work of art. Nowhere near what I thought they were making, but at least it's unique-looking.
8 minutes later
So that tiny splotch of blood from that vampire girl's lip earlier apparently has a mind of it's own. Don't ask me how that works, I'm just telling you guys what I'm seeing right now.
11 minutes later
So not only do we have a half human-half mecha sumo wrestler that has a mini turret on it's head, but also, Monami's mother can also produce bloodied-blade skates on her feet. I'm telling you, guys, this movie is extremely creatively with itself and it's something that I probably would never come up with if I were attempting to make this sort of film. It's really quite fascinating.
10 minutes later
I'll say this right now, guys, the level of dark humor the movie is going through is mind-blowing. Mind you, it's really funny, but I didn't think they would be going this far with it. It's really something else, and I'm loving it.
5 minutes later
Holy Shit! All right, well, I can certainly say that I wasn't quite expecting for a head to explode like that. But shit, that was awesome!
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Wow, just...where the hell do I even begin with this one? Well, first off, I am gonna say up front that I really enjoyed this movie. In terms of these splatter films, it lives up to those other Japanese splatter movies I've seen beforehand such as "Mutant Girls Squad", "Tokyo Gore Police", and I'll even include "The Machine Girl" because it's also technically a splatterfest as well. Now do I think it's as good as those movies were, in terms of writing? No, not really, and I'll get to why in a second. But still, what I did get here is still really enjoyable.
Let's get into this proper here and first talk about the writing. The writing in this movie is honestly one of the only weak points that it has against it. And it's not necessarily that it's a bad story, it's just that it's not really gonna be the main focus here. But to give you guys a summary version of it: It's essentially a just a teen romance story centered around a guy named Jugon, who ends up falling for a girl by the name of Monami, who just so happens to also be a vampire, and she gives him some chocolate to profess her love to him, which the latter is actually a custom in Japan. But anyway, you have another girl by the name of Keiko, who later ends up turning into a Frankenstein thanks to her Dad, who is the principal of the high school she attends and is also a kabuki scientist. Don't ask why he's a kabuki scientist, it really doesn't matter. And so, it's a battle between Monami and Keiko to see who can win the love of Jugon.
Now as I may have mentioned a couple of times beforehand, I despise teen romance stories. I hated it in "Whisper of the Heart" and I hated it in "Psychic School Wars". And in any other movie, I would've disregarded this movie entirely because of it's premise alone. However, I'm not going to do that here. Why? Because even though it's centered around a premise that I'm not a fan of, what helps elevate it is that the movie is a horror comedy. And not just a regular horror comedy, but also very unapologetic as well. Because this movie delves into the kind of dark comedy that I really do enjoy. The movie has racial stereotypes, Japanese girls in blackface, to even jokes about suicide and wrist cutting. And in terms of the first one, they literally have a Chinese guy with a *ridiculously* long mustache. Which is fucking hilarious as hell, though if they *really* wanted to play up the offensive stereotype, they could've added some buck teeth as well. Just my own personal opinion, really. And I know some people aren't into the overly offensive type of dark humor, but I will say that Mr. Nishimura definitely had a sense of humor that I don't see from many filmmakers anymore. Well, at least the ones in the U.S. anyway.
But setting that part aside, if I had to give any kind of critique about the humor in this film, I would say that it kinda overloads you with all this wacky, goofy, madness that, if you're watching this on your first go, you may not be able to grasp everything at once. Because, like I just said, this movie is a horror comedy, and it sticks with that for the entirety of it's runtime. It rarely ever takes itself seriously as it mostly just focuses on being a full-blown horror comedy. The only "serious" bit that I could find in this movie is when you get to see Monami's backstory about her mother being killed by a vampire hunter, who also happens to be Francis Xavier. Which...sure, let's just roll with it. Although before that, her mother was able to produce blade-looking skates on her feet as she takes on a half-human/half-mecha sumo wrestler. Which, if you couldn't tell by this point, the movie doesn't take itself too seriously. Which, for a movie like this, is a good thing. Because had it played itself with a straight face the entire time, it would've destroyed this movie because it didn't try to have fun with itself.
So, just to give you guys a summarization, the writing in this movie is the weakest point in this film, at least in terms of it's plot. But for everything else such as humor and the special effects more than makes up for all of that. And I'm also going to include the acting. Now, upon starting this film, I was greeted to the Japanese version with English subtitles. And I should note that there is an option for an English dub here, however, I didn't watch it this time because, as I just said, upon pushing play, I got the Japanese audio with English subtitles. And I'm gonna say, guys, that the acting here is laughable. Now when I say it's laughable, I don't mean that in a negative way. I mean that most of the actors in this film ham it up a lot here. And it's actually really funny because it seemed like nobody was taking it too seriously. Which, if this were any other film that attempted this, I would've had a different opinion about it. But for this film, it totally works here because everyone in the cast, whether it's the main cast, or the supporting cast, everyone turns in a pretty decent showing, at least for what they had to work with here. So yes, guys, the acting here is hammy and a little bit over the top, but it still totally works for this kind of movie.
Now before I talk the special effects, I want to mention something that I almost never talk about when it comes to me covering movies for this series, which is the previews. And for this particular film, they only show one preview for another Japanese film that is similar to this called "RoboGeisha". Now I covered "RoboGeisha" a long time ago back in the early days of me writing this series, and I do remember the film actually kinda sucking a bit. And when they showed the previews for that movie here, I got another glimpse of the awful special effects that went on in that movie. I mean, the CG was terrible, the blood effects were all digitally done, it was just a really bad movie with really cheap special effects.
Which I can now segue-way into talking about the special effects for this movie because it shows you how much better they pull off the effects here. There is tons and tons of blood splatter, and while there is CG in this movie, it is nowhere *near* as awful as they were in "RoboGeisha". You do have scenes which they show digital blood here, and the effects for it, while very noticeably CG, it's still good enough to where you can view it as it being more believable. At least believable about a movie involving a vampire high school girl and a Frankenstein-esque girl. But still, the effects here are awesome, and some of it is very creative, too. Such as when you see the Frankenstein girl using part of someone's bare feet as a helicopter to fly. And no, I'm joking about that either. That happens in the third act of the film. But anyway, the costuming is also really good, too, as is the makeup effects. Whether it's the kabuki scientist, or custodian janitor being, uh, well, a vampire or zombie of sorts. I don't remember which one, but still, the makeup effects involving him are also pretty good, too.
Camerawork here is really good. Lighting is also lit very well. Sound-mixing is also good. And the music is also really good, too. There are a couple of songs here that are actually really catchy. I unfortunately don't know the title of these songs, but believe me when I say that they're very catchy and is worth giving a listen to, if at least just once. But yeah, guys, the score here and the soundtrack is really good.
And when all is said and done, guys, am I able to recommend "Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl"? Oh absolutely, guys, this movie is great. Well, I do have to stress that if you're not into these sorts of films where there's just a ton of blood splatter everywhere, then I don't think you should be watching this movie. But if you're looking for a good horror comedy, then I can totally recommend this film to you guys. Again, as long as you can overlook the excessive amounts of blood splatter here. And if you can do that, well, then you have a really good movie. And I'm actually happy myself knowing that I can actually add this one to my DVD collection. I was sorta fearing that it would disappoint me in someway, but I'm thankful that's not the case here. This movie is great, and I'll definitely find a spot for it for my ever growing DVD collection. Speaking of, I'm gonna go and watch "Tokyo Gore Police" right now because this film totally inspired me to go back and rewatch that one again. So I know what I'll be doing as soon I get done with this review.
Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
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