Yours truly hasn’t had the time to devote coverage of Asian Film Month, over the last week and a half. I’ve been busy with other things in life. so I haven’t had much time. Instead of completely scraping it, I’ve decided to extend it until mid-June. Thank you for your understanding and now to my review of “Deadball”.
I first heard about “Deadball”, when it played at the Fantasia Film Festival back in 2011. With its crazy premises and everything, I was interested in checking this film out as it had that Troma feel to it.
The film follows a baseball prodigy, who is one of the most feared people in Japan. After accidentally killing his own father with one of his pitches, he swore to never pitch again and enters into a life of crime that leads him to juvenile prison. He is forced into pitching and joining the prison’s team, after the headmistress forces him to do it. Now he must lead the team against a deadly girls’ team known as St. Black Dahlia High School. A team that’s both lethal and deadly on the field.
“Deadball” is one of those films you think it’s going to be uneventful film in the first ten minutes, then once the action and development picks up. Director Yudai Yamaguchi does a good job making this film fun to watch. I liked how he keeps the action moving at a good pace. Yamaguchi does that, by making the action and gore effects so outrageous that it keeps you interested in the film. The level of violence felt like you were watching a Troma film, as it helps make the film fun and entertaining. It’s something that you want to see, when watching a B-movie from Asia. The other thing that I liked about his direction was the fact the performance were so over the top that you’re having fun watching it. Yamaguchi does a good job making sure the personalities of the characters stand out in the performances. It helped my viewing experience considering that the screenplay didn’t have any logic to it.
Speaking the screenplay, I knew going in that there wasn’t going to be any logic to the story. I wasn’t expecting this to be a masterpiece, but still this was a fun film. The reason that Yamaguchi and Keita Tokaji’s screenplay work was the fact that the characters were so outrageous and fun to watch. I liked, the way that each of the writers gave their characters personality to their characters. It helped make the characters work well for me. The other thing in the screenplay that I liked was the third act of the film. This is where the action picked up and everything becomes so absurd that I was entertained. It was the case, where the writers throw everything at the screen and hope it works. Luckily for my viewing experience it worked. The only drawback that this screenplay has was that it didn’t have a coherent story that kept you glued. Maybe that’s asking much for this type of film, but the gore scenes and outrageous action in the third act made up for that.
This is not for everyone, as there are too many crazy things going on that it’ll be too shocking and uninteresting to you. But if you fan of these Japanese/Troma films, then you’re going to enjoy this film.
Review Rating: Three Stars.
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