Mr. Miike's past works include Ichi the Killer , Visitor Q , Gozu and the Dead or Alive trilogy, all of which have been strange, unique and not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach. Tests have shown that exposure to more than 2 Miike movies in a day have lead to a 78% loss of sanity in what can only be called "average" American movie viewers. His films are being considered by the Japanese government as an alternative to their lack of a standing military. Given the man's track record, he's not exactly the first person you'd expect to put out a family oriented movie, right? Well Mister and Missus Apple Pie, shake hands with The Great Yokai War.

As with any fantasy movie, this one revolves around a kid who's forced into a strange environment and is having trouble coping. In this case the kid in question is a young boy named Tadashi who used to live in Tokyo, but had to relocate into the countryside to live with his grandpa for reasons that aren't exactly spelled out for us. His family back in Tokyo is apparently too busy to come out and visit and he's had to put up with school bullies and the insane ramblings of senile old grandpa ever since arriving. During a parade in their village, Tad (not to be mistaken for Tad Hamilton) is picked by a guy in a dragon costume to represent the legendary boy hero known as the Kirin Rider in the upcoming summer festival. Uh-oh, the last movie I saw with a "legendary rider" of some sort was Eragon, and we all saw how clichéd that ended...

As the Kirin Rider, Tad's sole obligation is to dress up in a costume and ride around on a fake dragon, but the bullies (and crazy old out-of-his-mind Grandpa) convince Tad that the other requirement of being the big KR is to go up the nearby mountain into the cave of the Great Tengu (we call 'em Goblins over here) and retrieve the legendary Tengu Sword that's been sitting there guarded by the Big T after the original Kirin Rider defeated and befriended him, leaving him in charge of the mystical meat cleaver. With his undeveloped masculinity brought into question, Tad heads up the mountain to prove his worth and instead pisses himself and runs away when strange noises and bus-induced hallucinations find him instead. On the way home though he befriends a hamster looking puppet known as Sunekosuri whom he nurses to health and, we discover, is the yokai (Japanese spirit) whose sole purpose is "shin rubbing", i.e. leg humping... man, and I thought the Greek had a lot of imaginary friends.

While all this is going on, there's an evil looking guy named Kato Yasunori whose life ambitions extend beyond chauffeuring an eccentric crime-fighting millionaire around to more loftier goals like taking total vengeance on mankind. Vengeance for what? Well, all of the material possessions that mankind throws out, like broken blenders and obsolete electronics, seem to be resentful of their former owners for trashing them like they were no better than a beer goggled one-nighter picked up at Bump 'N' Grind. We never figure out exactly why he's taking vengeance on mankind in the name of these rejected machines (I mean, he's not a machine himself or anything, though he may have been married to a Shop Vac at some point), but we do know that he's convinced one yokai named Agi to play hench-chick for him. I'm not sure what Agi is the yokai of (unless it's bending over in mini-skirts, big white beehive hairdos or whipping things), but I do know that she's evil, she's hot and she likes to do shots of toxic waste. In short, she's my kind of woman. As for what Kato's plan of revenge is, it's a little more complicated than the old "flaming bag of dog shit at the front door" trick. By capturing and tormenting the local yokai population, Kato then tosses each of the creatures into a big industrial furnace along with pieces of neglected technology. When the rage of the inanimate objects (called "Yomatsumono") combines with the magic and suffering of the weakened yokai, the result is large twisted steel kill-bots stroking a big beef with the humanity who threw them away,

Heh heh, "stroking a big beef".

Back to our hero, Tad returns to the Tengu Cave when he fears his grandpa has gone there to pull the sword himself. What he finds instead is one big ploy by the local yokai, who deceived the kid to see if he had the guts to kick his fears in the junk in order to save a loved one. Having proven himself (after being harassed by the various freaks and weirdoes who inhabit the mountain), the yokai pronounce him as the true Kirin Rider and Tad's new amigos march him through the Tengu Cave to pull the Tengu Sword... after the escapes the Runaway Tengu Boulder and crosses the Rotted Wooden Tengu Bridge placed precariously over the Bottomless Tengu Ravine. You get the idea.

Inside GT's chamber, Tad is given the big crazy demon bird man's sword just in time for his little posse to be attacked by the emerging Agi and her heavy metal attack squad of chainsaw wielding killer toasters. The "Great" Tengu turns out to be not-so-great as Agi whips his ass with one of those cat toys that consists of a ribbon on a stick, shredding his wings and leaving him vulnerable for her scrap metal screw heads to capture the big guy and fly off with his blue ass in tow. As for Tad, he takes down one of the mechanized menaces with his fancy butter knife, only to have his blade snapped in half by Agi's whip and to be left for dead when the bad guys drop the cavern down around his prepubescent skull as his leg-humping pet is also taken by the sexy beehive rockin' she-devil. When the kid wakes up, he's in the midst of the remainder of the region's yokai... none of which are interested in fighting Kato's plans for global revenge. When the few willing to stick by Tad step forward (a comedy relief turtle man, a red-faced drunkard, a bean washing freak-o, a fin handed mermaid and a 35ft sentient length of ribbon), the group go after Kato whose industrial complex hideout has sprouted wings and has taken a cue from Mothra, now nesting in downtown Tokyo!

The yokais' resident sword smith escapes the klutches of Kato and is picked up by the small band of rebels so he can fix that cheap ass busted Tengu Sword that probably has "Made in Taiwan" printed down the side of it's blade. But, with the sword re-forged and after donning his union regulation "Legendary Hero" uniform, it's time for the big "storming the castle" climax. Of course it wouldn't exactly be a "great" yokai war with only 5 of the title spooks, but how do we introduce more of them when it's already been established that they're not interested in fighting? Well, you take a play from "The Big Bush Book of War Mongering" and you tell your people what they want to hear while hoping they don't figure out that they're actually being killed and maimed to serve your own financial fetishes. In this case, the yokai of all of Asia are lead to believe that their head honcho (quite literally in this matter as he's just a giant head) is throwing the biggest rave in yokai history and Tokyo's the epicenter of the party. But, just cuz you can lead a high school girl to a kegger doesn't mean you can make her drink, so how do the yokai get into the fight once they've amassed their numbers at Kato's krib? The robot monsters (lacking in gorilla bodies frankly) start a fight and the weirdoes all join in under the understanding that it's a "festival fight"...hey, whatever works, so long as the movie lives up to it's name somehow damn it.

Back to Tad, he infiltrates Robot Hell and has to face off with his former appendage raping hand puppet-turned-sickle wielding mutant killer robeast in the mandatory metaphorical "time to leave your childhood behind" moment. But, not only does our hero have to kill his former pet-friend, but when he sheds his tears on the deactivated dust buster of doom, it immediately transforms back into Sunekosuri... all mutilated and covered in puppet gore... if I cry right now, would that count as me being a sensitive guy that women will flock to or a big pussy that men will mock to?

So, now fueled by the rage over his lost friend, Tadashi wipes his tears, grits his teeth and grabs his sword, determined to put an end to the evil that is Kato. Will embracing that anger be what the kid needs to make his final triumph over the villain and his evil yokai mistress, or will it only serve to seal the antagonists' victory? What was Kato's former relationship with the yokai and what's his grudge against humanity? And why does he only wear one glove?! Will Agi and Kato finally merge in their bid for world conquest and if so, what will be the result of this unholy merger? If Tad is the Kirin Rider, where the fuck is his Kirin?! Lastly, what role if any, will the bean washer and a jingle about his favorite legume play in all of this? Dude, it’s Miike, so don't pretend like you know the answers to ANY of those questions unless you've seen the movie. Whatever the case, the ending's not something I would call a happy one...

Judging by the four-out-of-five rating perched at the top of this review, Miike obviously did more than a few things right here. The movie wasn't so much a job for the director as it was a labor of love. The man's said that in the entire year they spent working on the film, he never once felt that it was a burden. Most movies he's been known to get tired and even fed up with the longer that shooting runs, but with The Great Yokai War he was quoted as saying this was a movie that would stay with him forever and that he wishes he could've kept working on long after the deadline, not so much because he feels that anything was rushed or needed to be redone, but because like any kid he didn't want the fun to end. Yes, on the surface he may be an unbalanced degenerate author of the obscenities in his twisted little world, but inside he's a giddy little kid who likes monsters, misses his mom and has a semi-sweet (yet still kinda creepy) curiosity with the female form. In terms of the tale, the story was okay albeit nothing insanely original.

Though I actually found the kid playing Tadashi to be uncharacteristically endearing for a child actor (believe me, I'll less likely to admit to that than I am to admitting I'm attracted to Bruce Campbell... uhm, which I'm not) and I dug the always sexy and diabolical Chiaki Kuriyama enjoying the hell out of playing Agi (always nice to see a woman who likes to not only play evil but to show off her butt while she's doing so), I wasn't really interested in Kato and that's not a good thing for playing the role that I'm either supposed to spew hate for or sit back in stark awe of. He wasn't exactly terrifying, he never showed me anything to drop my jaw and he just doesn't get enough attention or background to make me care. Truth be told I think I would've been happier if Agi had been the sole villain here. Would've made more sense anyway, since we also never find out why it is that the one time yokai turns her back on her former people anyway.

As for the movie itself, the make-up effects are great, the huge population of yokai are a parade of fun (or a screaming squid driven rocket car of terror depending your choice of halucinogen) and I tip my tip to the crew responsible for bringing these beasts to life the way they did. For the most part the CGI was passable with some of the robots coming out as both well done and memorably designed. My big problem though is the same problem I seem to have with any CGI: why the fuck can't they get the shadowing right?! Jurassic Park was over a decade ago and, though it cost 63 million Whopper Juniors to make, you can't tell me that whatever technology Spielberg’s minions were using back then can't be duplicated cheaply enough today so I don’t have to continue groaning and throwing empties at my tv every time I'm subjected to the type of mismatched tones and textures that are vomiting acid in my eyes like I'm seeing here! Somebody get me my Visine™ and my anti-rage medication before anymore Girl Scouts come knocking on my door and I need to open up a new box of Hefty™ Body Bags.

Let's bring this puppy in for a landing. In all honesty, I wouldn't so much call GYW a "kid" movie or even a "family" movie so much as I'd call it a movie aimed at adults who embrace their inner child... and not in the Catholic priest way, ya prevert (intentional spelling for an inside joke, let it go Grammar Nazi). Amidst my (very) limited circle of associates, each one of them agrees that some of the movies we watched as kids are still cool enough by our current standards to warrant owning in our DVD collections and not being ashamed of when we bring over potential bed buddies. For us, trippy stuff like Labyrinth and Return to Oz fit this bill, and The Great Yokai War will appeal to that same part of you with it's innocent fish-out-of-water child hero who meets his first crush, a cast of bizarre and endearing heroes and nightmarish (but never graphically violent) monster villains, and it's simple-but-relevant social commentary. However, if you're wondering whether it will still work for it's intended purpose as an alternative form of fantasy entertainment for your kids to keep them from the clutches of Disney but still out of your hair long enough to wrestle with your significant other for a couple hours, you might want to consider the following: the monsters might be a little more than your kids can handle (if they start screaming in terror every time they see your microwave, don't blame me), the yokai themselves can be a little much as well (think of the original Grimm fairy tales, only more, uhm, grim), there are a few moments that are a little too sexual in nature (like everyone being fascinated with the River Princess' wet inner thigh and long-neck lady licking Tad's face with a sick look in her eye) and the ending's really depressing if your kid isn't looking for an excuse to Cobain themselves before graduating high school (think Pete's Dragon, only without the reassuring aspects). In other words, if you plan on letting your kids watch it, give it a quick screening yourself first and you be the judge. It's not as neglectful as being one of those stupid fucks who buys their 10 year-old Grand Theft Auto to make up for their not being around to raise them, but you're always better safe than sorry, especially if you find yourself trying to justify letting your kid watch a Takashi Miike movie to their therapist in 20 years.

Though I'm not about to declare the movie as brilliant simply because it's a Miike film (I like most of his movies, but I'm far from being planted up his crapper like some people), I'm also not about to shoot it down because of the same reason, as I'm not the type of guy looking to take pot shots at Miike just because the art school crowds eat his shit for breakfast. Take the man our of the picture and it's still a good flick and should be near the top of your "Shit I Should Rent in the Next Couple Weeks" list... unless you're just looking for another retarded Jennifer Lopez movie or direct-to-video sequel to a shit-ass '90s horror flick, in which case I've got some used copies of I'll Always Know What You Did Last Summer that should fit nicely up that enflamed anus of yours. I'm not saying I'm better than you, but I am.