Chanbara Beauty Vortex

Title -

Chanbara Beauty Vortex

Language - Japanese

genre - Zombie, chanbara













 

This is the second film based on the Oneechanbara/bikini zombie hunter games (I’ve reviewed the first film here) but it’s not a sequel in as much as it doesn’t carry on from the first film.  I’m sure if it could be classed as a reboot either as it is based on one of the later games and so the story comes from that and not the early game the first film follows.

Chanbara Beauty Vortex is (loosely) based on the Oneechanbara: Bikini samurai Squad game released for the Xbox 360, which happens to be the only one I’ve played.  The film is set 20 years after the accidental release of the zombies by the organization who are trying to find a way of making themselves immortal.  This time around Aya and Saki are allies and are trying to stop the zombies.  Both of the sisters have Imchi blood, which means that if they get too much blood on them they will go into a berserk like rage.  A woman called Misery meets them and tells them that Himiko, the leader of the Organization wants to use Saki’s blood to finish off the immortality formula; she also manages to convince Saki that she would be able to resurrect her parents but they will also need the blood for another girl. Saki goes along with Misery’s plan and the trick Aya into helping them capture Kei who lives in a camp with other children and is protected by Reiko & Ryo.  Saki and Misery get away with Kei and Aya and Ryo go after them, Reiko is injured and stays behind to look after the rest of the children in the camp.  The rest of the film is taken up by Aya and Ryo’s journey to find Saki and Saki discovering that Misery is not all that she seems.  The film ends with Aya and Ryo catching up with Misery and fighting her for Kei.

As I’ve said Chanbara Beauty Vortex is loosely based up on the Oneechanbara: Bikini samurai squad game for the Xbox 360 and even starts with a shower scene in the same way the game does.  It has the main characters form the game but Reiko’s part in the film is much shorter than in the game and the character of Himiko is different.  The final battle with Misery see’s her using her long spiked sword and the stronger zombies look like men in black rejects.  I was a bit disappointed by the absence of the killer whale zombie; it could have been an amusing addition to the film.

I think that Vortex is the better of the two films.  The Film seems to flow better, there is more time spent on the journey whereas the first film jumps from scene to scene.  Vortex does not seem to use special effects in quite the same way either; there seems to be less use of any magic or any kind of energy blast that the first film had, concentrating more on the rage that the Imchi blood causes.  There are still the blood splats on the camera but as these are part of the game they do fit.

The zombies and the fight scenes also seem a bit better although there are odd bits of continuity that don’t seem to make sense, for example in one of the first fights Aya cuts a zombie in half and the legs and the head remain in motion until she puts he sword through its head but in all other scenes once a zombie has been ‘killed’ it disintegrates even if it’s not killed with a ‘head shot’.  There is also a scene where Aya is fighting with some of the more advanced zombies we see her lose both swords and she gets one for Ryo but after the fight all the swords are back with their rightful owners..

Over all Chanbara Beauty vortex is an entertaining film that doesn’t need much brain power to follow.