Having seen the 2005 "Meatball Machine" movie, then I wasn't particularly in a hurry to watch the 2017 "Kodoku: Mîtobôru Mashin" (aka "Kodoku: Meatball Machine") movie.
But still, being a fan of Asian cinema and having a fondness of gore, I opted to sit down and watch this 2017 movie from director Yoshihiro Nishimura nonetheless. But it wasn't with much of any expectations at heart.
Turns out that this movie was every bit as odd, bizarre and well silly as the 2005 "Meatball Machine" movie.
Yeah, a simplistic storyline served with an abundance of blood and gore, and over-the-top creature ideas and pseudo-low budget special effects. Some enjoy this combination tremendously, others don't, and some even just find it to be mediocre.
I wasn't particularly impressed with this movie, and I found the storyline to be way too stupid and simplistic to offer any real enjoyment. And the characters in the movie weren't exactly fleshed out - pardon the pun - in an overly exciting manner, which resulted in the characters being mundane and pointless.
However, I did enjoy the gore, the grotesque ideas for creature designs and the downright campy, craziness that there was to the movie. But it was hardly sufficient to alleviate for the movie's shortcomings in terms of script and characters.
I was, however, pleasantly surprised to see Eihi Shiina make an appearance in this movie. But then again, she is no stranger to this particular weird genre of Japanese gore.
My rating for this movie is a less than mediocre four out of ten stars. The movie wasn't impressive, nor particularly entertaining or enjoyable. Sure, there were some golden moments here and there, but in general, don't get your hopes up for this one.
