Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on September 2010

©2009キングゲーム製作委員会

This laughable piece of tripe uses the age-old technique of taking characters from their normal lives and placing them in an artificially staged situation (think Cube or last year’s Japanese flick Kaiji). In this case, ten people are kidnapped, taken to a Tokyo hotel (or so they think), and forced to play the game of the title, in which the holder of the “king stick” can demand that others do exactly what he or she wishes. The story centers around a young man named Suzu (Takuya Ishida), who seems to keep his composure better than the others. Not only is the overall situation ridiculous and the characters’ reactions astoundingly infantile, at no point can we believe these are real people with rational thoughts and human feelings. Absurd plot twists that shatter any possible suspension of disbelief—it turns out the group has actually been steaming out to sea on an ocean liner the whole time—are capped off with a conclusion that is deeply racist. Definitely on the shortlist for Worst Film of the Year. (93 min)