'Why Don't You Play in Hell?' is hilariously insane

Japanese director Sion Sono has made a lot of odd movies, often ranging wildly in tone and content. He’s made films about cults, mass suicide, underskirt photography, serial killers, religion, the 2011 Japan earthquake, prostitution – the content and themes in the movies may be grim, but the tone has always been different. Suicide Club was a grim horror flick, Cold Fish was a creepy thriller, while Love Selection ranges the gamut from comedy, drama and horror as it continues.  

His latest, ‘Why Don’t You Play in Hell?’, is a radical tonal change from his other films, having a silly premise and taking it as ridiculously far as it can with it. It’s a bizarre comedy capped off with gushing, over the top violence. What’s it about? The passion and enthusiasm of wannabe filmmakers. Oh, and a bloody Yakuza clan war.

A bunch of weirdo movie buffs get together to make a movie club, called the ‘Fuck Bombers’. What they lack in skill they make up for with massive enthusiasm. Their leader, Hirata, has a strong passion for cinema, and tends to film real-life events, capturing them as he sees them being ‘cinematic’. The ultimate goal of the Bombers is to make a masterpiece.

Meanwhile a hit on Yakuza boss Muto goes awry when his wife Shizue slaughters the would-be assassins. Muto takes swift revenge on the rival clan, allowing the apologetic remnants to live on the agreement of a peaceful truce, but his wife is thrown in prison and his daughter Mitsuko’s actress dreams are shattered.

Ten years pass, some things change and some stay the same. The Fuck Bombers go nowhere, though their blind enthusiasm and passion remains. Hirata is still determined to make a masterpiece, but their star ‘action hero’ Sasaki has become disillusioned and frustrated after a decade of making amateur films that go nowhere.

On the other side, the Yakuza truce has dissolved as rival boss Ikegami has become obsessed with Mitsuko (ever since a chance encounter with her after the failed hit), who has now become a violent, rebellious young woman. With Shizue about to be released from prison, Muto is determined to make Mitsuko a film star, willing to go to any lengths. To that end he decides that the best way to kill two birds with one stone is to have a film crew capture their bloody assault on the Ikegami clan. The Fuck Bombers are hired by Muto to make Mitsuko’s film dreams a reality, giving Hirata and his friends the opportunity to shoot the biggest, most realistic gangster film ever.

It’s a silly film, not taking anything seriously but having a lot of fun with its premise.  As a Sion Sono movie it’s full of bizarre and strange characters in odd situations. After a brush with death, rival Yakuza boss Ikegami mandates that all his men should wear Kimonos and live in a castle. Hirata and the Fuck Bombers are downright enthusiastic about suicidally filming a Yakuza death battle, while the Yakuza themselves all get into the idea of their final bloody battle being a film.

There are issues. With so many characters and storylines there’s little room for character development and some characters and plot threads don’t get much time dedicated to them. This is very much a silly, oddball movie that’s happy to be simplistic and silly. A lot of scenes feel a bit odd and the constant switching between the numerous characters means you never get too good a handle on anybody. But in the end it doesn’t really matter too much, the movie’s weirdness allows these bizarre sequences and characters to mesh together well. It’s a simple movie, all goofy as hell but a lot of fun. The film is almost entirely build-up to its insane third act, and fucking hell is it crazy

The climactic finale is balls-to-the-wall insanity, with massive gushes of blood, severed limbs, sword clashes and hailing bullets, while the film crew runs around capturing everything. There’s a lot of fun to be had with the premise, with the film crew sporadically interrupting the very real battle to set up cameras and lighting and give direction.  It goes one step further, when the Yakuza ‘actors’ start agreeing to choreography and pretending they’re in action movies, dying in slow motion and wielding weapons stylistically even though it’s all real.

This is an odd, ridiculous movie, a distinct change from Sono’s previous film, the more serious and character-driven Himizu. And it’s a lot of fun. The finale alone is more than enough to sell the film, but everything else comes together well, forming a bizarre comedy with a unique premise and strange characters.