If you have been reading my reviews for a while, you might notice how I go on about plot structure or how films aren’t as compelling due to a weak script. I might comment on sloppy direction or some other elements that just don’t work. But there’s force that some films try so hard to fake and some films just don’t have it: fun. You cannot fake a good time to an audience. But boy if your film is fun, sometimes, my friend, that is all a picture needs to do for us. And “Machine Girl” is absolutely fun.

First a bit of background: there’s been a huge climb in youth suicide and violence within the Japanese community. Suicides have risen 60% in middle school students. From mid 1990s to now school yard violence has risen nearly 500%! There’s something happening in the culture of Japanese youths and is something vastly troubling. Out of this outbreak, filmmakers have been grappling with the whys and there’s a bit of subgenre coming out, a “dove style violence” and are old torture master Takashi Miike has helmed a few films dealing with this. “Fudoh”, “Visitor Q”, “Crows: Zero” but more famously “Battle Royale” and “Suicide Club” have explored this what seemingly is felt as a Japanese phenomenon. But youth violence is not exclusive to them, think Columbine or here in my own city, the Von Muar Massacre. But the key difference is there’s not a tidal wave of Hollywood produced gore films to explain this undercurrent in society.

But leave it to our buddies from the Far East. Based on my background though, “Machine Girl” might be one of the loosest based “dove style violence” films, but nonetheless, it pretty much matters not. “Machine Girl” is smartly produced by Media Blasters, a small third party DVD distribution company (wisely because these niche market companies are fading), but that’s the only American touch here. Noboru Iguchi directs the hell out of this film, in fusing surreal imagery, dark comedy, and the goriest deaths seen in a while.

The story is a standard revenge film. Brother dies, sister kills everyone. But again, who kind of cares, because this film features a Japanese school girl in a mini skirt with a machine gun for an arm! The opening five minutes will set the tone for the film. “Machine Girl” is like what if Takashi Miike directed “Kill Bill” version of “Evil Dead II”, while you’ve drank 6 Red Bulls. Seriously.

So what makes it so much fun? Well, the film gathers and releases energy. It’s the type of film, while no matter how much fun I’d say it is to my parents, they aren’t going to see it. It plays to a specific audience, an audience that gets these bizarre, gory, slapstick films. It’s more of an action film, but the violence is highly reminiscent of the end of “Kill Bill Volume 1”. Big blood sprays, lots of limps being hacked off. “Machine Girl” is a wild trip that most will love if you’re the target audience. I had a smile on my face the entire 95 minute time I watched it, although I did have one question: Where to I reserve my copy for Iguchi’s next movie, “Tokyo Gore Police”?