Iguchi Noboru’s The Machine Girl (2008) is a fast-paced action film that defies genre conventions. The film follows Ami, a college student who exacts revenge on school bullies and their yakuza connections after they kill her brother and cut her arm off. The film’s combination of choreographed fight scenes, excessive gore, and playful humour provides a stark contrast to Japanese filmic tradition. His excessive use of violence is characteristic of Japanese cinema, however, the excessive gore is indicative of how desensitized to violence modern audiences are. The film uses several parodist elements in order to redefine Japanese film, making it self-aware. The juxtaposition of iconic imagery also suggests a change in Japanese film. Iguchi uses excessive violence, parodist elements, and the juxtaposition of iconic imagery to subvert Japanese filmic tradition.
Excessive gore and violence is certainly part of Japanese filmic tradition, however, Iguchi takes this aspect of Japanese film and makes the violence even more over-the-top. Anderson and Richie in their book The Japanese Film: Art and Industry state, “Pointless killing is one of the main features of the Japanese film, whether chambara or modern gangster movie” (318). They go even further explicating that “Japanese films also tend to accentuate the attendant gore” (Anderson 318). Anderson and Richie use the noise of bones breaking as a kid jumps on his chest in Nikkatsu’s Beyond the Green (1955) as an example. This example pales in comparison to the gore and violence in Iguchi’s The Machine Girl.
In one scene, Ami shoots one of the hitmen for the yakuza in the face. As her machine gun goes off we are exposed to the bits of flesh coming off, slowly exposing the facial muscles. The blood spurts everywhere almost like a fountain from the man’s neck. The hitman is still alive, and we are made aware of this through his frantic running and screaming. This attempt to make the gore even more over-the-top is an active attempt to point out how violence is ingrained in modern culture. He suggests that nowadays it is not enough to see a person get shot; to provoke a response, that person must have his flesh slowly blown away as he screams in agony.
The film’s self-reflexivity lends it to be a critique of the way Japanese culture is portrayed in contemporary media. Roland Kelts in his book Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture Has Invaded the U.S explicates how Japanese culture is portrayed in the United States. Kelts argues that the American conception has a lot to with manga and anime, describing it as “playful, colourful, cute, and sometimes crazy” (208). The Machine Girl definitely plays with this conception of culture to convey a sense of irony.
In the film, Ami searches for one of the bullies who killed her brother. After an extended fight with the bully’s parents, the mother dips Ami’s hand in tempura batter before deep frying her arm. Ami slowly reveals her arm which looks like a giant piece of tempura. The scene is cartoon-like, clearly parodying manga and Japanese anime. However, the scene is still brutal as it does depict a young girl getting her arm burnt. The anime-like aspects of the scene are contrasted by the harsh screams of Ami, a character that the audience identifies with. In introducing the brutality into this parody, Iguchi suggests that there is something wrong with this conception of Japanese culture. Although it can be seen as playful, colourful, and sometimes crazy, there is a sense of brutality underlying the superficial conception of Japanese culture.
Iguchi uses contrasting imagery to explicate the state of Japanese cinema, suggesting that it is not immune to the effects of an increasingly globalized culture. The katana, a sword used most often in chambara films, is iconic because it represents a whole genre of Japanese film. Although the katana is used in the film, Ami primarily uses a machine gun. The machine gun is also iconic; it is a product of the 80’s action film in the United States. In the final scene, a bloody Ami walks towards a katana with a machine gun for an arm. The camera slowly revolves around Ami as she lifts the sword upwards; as the camera revolves we are shown more of the machine gun until she strikes her final pose; katana and machine-gun pointing straight at the camera. The scene is the synthesis of American and Japanese filmic tradition. Ami openly accepts both weapons, clearly accepting the globalized nature of film. By combining these iconic images Iguchi seems to be a proponent for the integration of western tropes into Japanese cinema.
Iguchi Noboru’s The Machine Girl is an outlandish film that is entertaining to watch. I would recommend this film due to its originality and over-the-top gore. It’s cartoon-like violence and unrealistic special effects make the gore bearable. Although the film is clearly exploitative in nature, it does have academic value. Iguchi actively subverts Japanese filmic tradition through over-the-top violence, parodist elements, and the juxtaposition of iconic images. The film is a throwback to both American and Japanese film, but in borrowing elements from these filmic traditions Iguchi creates a film that is certainly unique.
Bibliography
Anderson, Joseph L., and Donald Richie. The Japanese Film: Art and Industry. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1982. Print.
Kelts, Roland. Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture Has Invaded the U.S. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. Print.