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Released by: Artsmagic
Released on: April 25, 2006.
Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Cast: Makiko Kuno, Yutaka Matsushige, Ren Osugi, Kanta Ogata
Year: 1992
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The Film:
A pretty young woman named Akiko has recently landed herself a job of Akabone, a typically faceless corporation with big offices and a fairly strong economic presence. On her first day on the job, she takes a cab to the office but unfortunately gets stuck in traffic. While she's stuck, the erratic cab driver tells her about a news story he heard in which an insane sumo wrestler slaughtered his wife and the man she was having an affair with, and how he got off by pleading insanity instead of having to serve time in prison for his crimes.
Akiko finally gets to work where she meets her lecherous boss Karoume and the rest of the team that she'll be working with, all of whom seem either depressed or just plain weird, something which is confirmed to her by the head of the HR department, a young man named Hyodo.
After a few days on the job, Akiko notices that a new security guard has started, a rather large man who keeps to himself and spends a lot of time in the shadows. He's an eerie figure, made all the more frightening by the fact that since he's started with Akabone, employees have gone missing, never to be seen or heard from again. When Akiko and Hyodo get stuck in the office after hours one day, putting in some over time to complete an important project, the reality of who the new security guard really is and just what he's capable of sets in and Akiko's life will never be the same again.
Best known for Pulse (a.k.a. Kairo), Kiyoshi Kurosawa has, over the last decade and a half or so, proven to be a talented and rather unpredictable director. Rather than play by genre rules, his films tend to mix elements of dark humor or almost science fiction like aspects of technology, making for some unique viewing and often times rather startling images. With The Guard From The Underground Kiyoshi Kurosawa has taken the basic North American slasher film and given it his unique twist, managing to work in a lot of incredibly morose humor but not sacrificing mood or scares by doing so.
Set almost completely in an office (a rather odd setting for a slasher movie but when you think about how much strange activity can and does go on seemingly on a daily basis in the average office building, maybe no so much), the movie hits at a pretty brisk pace and while the gore isn't as nasty as other movies of its ilk, there are enough quality kills in here to keep those expecting some bloody death scenes happy enough. What's more interesting however isn't the results of the kills or the gore that they produce but rather the unrelenting sadism behind them - the murderer truly hates everyone he gets his hands on and his methods confirm this with sheer brutality and inventive nastiness. Kurosawa also manages to build suspense quite effectively with some subtle and not so subtle foreshadowing. When our heroine discovers an impromptu shrine constructed in her honor within the confines of the office, she's understandably freaked out and she, as well as the view, know that something bad will come out of it.
While there are a few spots that are just a tad too predictable for their own good and the fact that we know who the killer is more of less from the start hurt the movie a little bit, there's enough effective black humor, stylish cineamtography and decent acting in The Guard From The Underground to easily recommend it to those who enjoy slasher films or quirky foreign oddities.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Though the transfer suffers from the typically muted colors and slight murkiness that for some strange reason seems to be so prevalent in Japanese cinema (this also seems to be a stylistic choice), it is otherwise problem free aside for some very mild mpeg compression artifacts. The interlaced 1.66.1 anamorphic picture is stable with a decent level of detail present throughout and a rather pleasant lack of edge enhancement. Not perfect, but good.
You've got your choice of watching the film in one of two Japanese language tracks - the original Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo track and a fancy schmancy Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound mix. The 5.1 mix is the way to go if you're so equipped, as it fills out the mix quite nicely but even the 2.0 track sounds nice too. Dialogue is clean and clear and there are no problems with hiss or distortion. The English subtitles are easy to read and free of any typographical errors.
First up is a full length commentary with Japanese film expert Tom Mes of Midnight Eye, who gives us enough background information on the director and the performers in the film as well as enough critical insight into the themes and ideas behind it all to make for a very interesting listen. Things get a tad dry in spots but Mes keeps the information coming pretty much throughout and he does a good job of pointing some interesting details and intracacies that are easy to miss the first time out.
Rounding out the extra features are text biographies and filmographies for the key cast members used in the production and for Kiyoshi Kurosawa himself.
The Final Word:
The Guard From The Underground could have looked and sounded a little better than it does on this DVD but movie itself is quite good as it effectively combines some twisted humor and some decent scares into one completely enjoyable package.
