Video Backlog: "Sinking of Japan (Nihon Chinbotsu, 2006)"

Publisher: Edko Films Ltd (Hong Kong)
Format: Region 3 DVD, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional English and Chinese Subtitles
Length: 134 minutes
Production Date: 2006
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

I really liked the original 1973 version of this film (known variously as “Japan Sinks”, “Submersion of Japan” etc.). It was a Toho special effects filled epic which was true to its title. The acting was pretty good and the effects gave Hollywood a run for their money. Surprisingly it was also rather melancholic and downbeat. I have the Hong Kong disc of that film which cuts at least 10 minutes from its runtime, a fact I wasn’t aware of when I bought it. I’m not sure if it’s a better film because of this, as I’ve heard others say the film is way too long.

I knew Shinji Higuchi was directing this film and had very high hopes for it. Higuchi was a core member of Daicon Film. Most notably he did the special effects on their epic “The Eight-Headed Giant Serpent Strikes Back”, the only Daicon Film to receive a proper commercial video release that wouldn’t send copyright lawyers swarming to the front door of Gainax. He also did the special effects for their other tokusatsu shorts and became a storyboard artist for many Gainax productions. Outside of the studio he worked on “Godzilla (1984, aka Return of Godzilla or Godzilla 1985)”, “Mikadoroid” and was special effects director for the 1990’s Gamera trilogy, considered the best daikaiju films ever made in many people’s eyes. In the last 10 years, he’s gotten into directing. His first film was “Lorelei”, a sci fi submarine film. That was a well-received film. “Sinking of Japan” is his second feature.

Well, it does start off with quite a bang, with a rather spectacular scene where Tokyo rescue squad member, Reiko (Kou Shibasaki), saves submarine pilot Toshio (Tsuyoshi Kusanagi) and young orphaned girl Misaki (Mayuko Fukuda) from an explosion in post-earthquake Tokyo. While dangling from a helicopter, of course. We soon get to the meat of the story with the discovery of the fact the plate Japan sits on will be dragged under the ocean. 40 years is given as a date that this disaster will happen, but the actual time they have left is latter discovered to be 338 days. Plausibility went out the window at this stage. I really tried hard to suspend disbelief, but couldn’t. Things just got sillier and sillier. The prime minister’s plane is engulfed by a volcanic eruption which reaches the cruising level of a 737. The wacko overacting scientist, who discovered Japan has less than a year left, comes with a crazy plan to blast Japan away from its plate using N2 bombs (borrowed from NERV perhaps?). Add in the rather frustrating and really awkward relationship between Reiko and Toshio clumsily brought together in the script by Misaki, played by Mayuko Fukuda, the girl with the acting range and ability of a rock.

While the plot is absurd, the dialogue woeful and the acting substandard, it somehow manages to be a bit more entertaining than a lot of Hollywood films in the same genre, though at times by not much. There is quite a good base here for an excellent disaster movie. Forgetting the implausibility of the plate Japan sits on suddenly sinking into the crust of the earth, you have the problem of refugees, the politics behind all of that and the problems of evacuation, seeing as planes can’t take off due to the volcanic ash I the air. This is reasonably explored, except for the whole Japan is being abandoned crap. Do they really have to get all nationalistic on us? Arrg! The resolution on how Japan is saved is pretty silly too. So Japan can gather up hundreds of drilling rigs in to time at all from around the world, yet there’s only two deep sea submarines in Japan? And both have to be manned and there’s no robotic submarines and they couldn’t borrow and one else’s? What the fuck? I know it was a plot device, however how it was used and the end result was pointless and annoying. At least the special effects were really good, and the cinematography was brilliant. However in the light of the recent earthquake and tsunami, it’s a bit disturbing. 5 out of 10, and I’m being really generous.

Remaining Backlog: 26 months (it's much easier this way than listing the number of discs).