Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		2.0

Gun Woman Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 28, 2015

Note to one Norman Bates: you might have had less to clean up in that shower if you had used a gun. That’s one of the salient if unspoken lessons learned in the opening sequence of Gun Woman, an exploitation film that in many ways defies description but which strives (and often succeeds) to deliver a shocking, unsettling and (for some, anyway) disgusting array a blood soaked mayhem. Intentionally pulpy to the “nth” degree, Gun Woman may not have quite the built in distress level of, say, A Serbian Film or even The Human Centipede, but it at least doesn’t posit any high-falutin’ rationale for its gonzo proclivities. This is a film that knows it’s a grindhouse wannabe, a sort of (really) low level La Femme Nikita knockoff where a revenge fantasy plays out which involves the training (and surgical transformation) of the titular Gun Woman (Asami). Hobbled somewhat by an awkward framing device (one which includes that aforementioned death via handgun in a shower), Gun Woman soon ports over into a longish flashback sequence which delivers the nuts and bolts (and blood and guts) of the story.

Asami has been something of a go-to girl for all sorts of so called "J exploitation" films (not to mention porn outings), but some may recall she played a relatively straight and narrow character in the schlockfest Machine Girl , a film which saw a pair (including Asami) help a young woman to be, in Six Million Dollar Man fashion, “better than (s)he was,” with the addition of a gun where her (missing) arm used to be. Gun Woman takes that idea to an almost ludicrous next step, though the actual mechanics of that choice won’t be spoiled here, other than to say Gun Woman figures out a way to smuggle a weapon into a place with a gun ban. Suffice it to say this technique might be thought of as the antithesis to “open carry.”

Before Gun Woman can get to that questionable element, though, it first has to trundle through the framing story involving hitmen and then the basic setup delivered via flashback, where one act of revenge of course only sparks more retribution. The first act of vengeance (at least in his own mind) is committed at the hands of the son (Noriaki R. Kamata) of a local mobster who dies. The son lashes out at his father’s doctor (or more accurately, the doctor and the doctor’s wife), pushing the good physician over into near The Phantom of the Opera-esque madness. Now redubbed Mastermind (Kaira Narita), the doctor “acquires” mute drug addict Mayumi, who, after a rigorous training regimen as an assassin, is herself soon rechristened as Gun Woman.

That sets up the completely over the top final act, which takes place in a boutique Japanese shop which caters to necrophiliacs. Gun Woman impersonates a corpse, “retrieves” her weapons, and finally exacts revenge on a whole bevy of interlopers before she gets to her ultimate goal. This sequence is admittedly brilliantly conceived and even executed (no pun intended), with Asami literally kicking ass in nothing but her birthday suit (which is covered with a fair amount of splatter and her own wounds early on). But director Kurando Mitsutake is like a kid playing with too many toys at times, offering quasi-hallucinogenic passages and quick cutting editing techniques that do little to distract from the underlying sleaze.

Structurally, the film has issues due to Mitsutake’s reliance on the framing device involving two other hitmen on a car trip to Las Vegas. Too often (especially in the film's opening half hour, but even beyond that), Mitsutake cuts back to the pair en route as they either simply go over previously depicted plot points or add their own largely needless two cents’ worth. Once the film cartwheels into its Grand Guignol wrap up, momentum is reestablished, though by that point there’s little interest other than in watching the cartoonish body count accrue.

Note: This is the first Shout! Factory Blu-ray disc I've personally reviewed which features a non-skippable boot up ad for the new Shout TV streaming service.

Gun Woman Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Gun Woman is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Scream Factory, an imprint of Shout! Factory, with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. According to Mitsutake's actually pretty interesting English language commentary included on this Blu-ray, he and cinematographer slash buddy Toshiyuki Imai shot the film with a Sony FS-700, though a cursory glance through the screencaptures accompanying this review proves more than adequately that a lot of tweaking was done in post, something that makes assessing the video quality of this release a little difficult. There's very little here that "pops" in a traditional high definition way (aside, ironically, from one fairly brief moment featuring a still photograph). Instead, the image is often intentionally distressed, including a fairly gritty layer of "grain" which gives the film a look approximating 16mm at times. Colors are graded all over the place, and contrast has been pushed to the blooming point in several key sequences. Still, once you get into the "visual rhythm" of this interesting looking piece, sharpness and clarity are generally very good (when they're not being toyed with), and close-ups often reveal startling levels of fine detail (see screenshot 18). Some of the pushed contrast leads to slight banding which is especially noticeable in very light gradients (bright whites, etc.).

Gun Woman Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Gun Woman features a noisy but fun DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix, largely in English though with interstitial moments in Japanese (with optional English subtitles). As might be expected, sequences like Gun Woman's training montage or the final, brutal series of showdowns she has in the necrophiliac lounge (there's a phrase I never expected to write when I got up this morning) have a lot of discrete channelization with everything from gun shots to bones crunching receiving good attention to detail. Gun Woman herself doesn't have a lot to say (a bit of an understatement), but what dialogue there is is presented cleanly, though it appears a lot of the hitman material (in the car to Vegas) may have been post looped. Fidelity is fine and dynamic range very wide on this problem free track. (For the record, there's a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 iteration also included as an option.)

Note: This release offers three subtitle options, one for the entire film (Japanese and English dialogue), one for just the Japanese dialogue, and a third for the Japanese commentary.

Gun Woman Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Making of Gun Woman (1080i; 47:46) is a good in depth piece featuring some informative interviews.


• Trailers (1080p; 3:43)


• Commentary with Writer/Director Kurando Mitsutake and actress Asami (Japanese with English subtitles)


• Commentary with Writer/Director Kurando Mitsutake (English)

Gun Woman Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Director Kurando Mitsutake states in his commentary that he considers Gun Woman an homage of sorts to Sam Peckinpah, which may be a bit of wishful thinking. A more apt cinematic reference might be the florid revenge fantasies of such films as Death Wish, along with a few salient plot points lifted whole cloth from La Femme Nikita. Stylistically and even from a certain plot perspective, Gun Woman is often a fascinating outing, but in execution (again, sorry) it frequently falls flat, too often tipping over into silliness instead of maintaining a more rigorously dour outlook. Fans of the Luc Besson film (as well as his "energetic" sense of action sequences) may find enough here to warrant checking out, but there's quite a bit of potentially objectionable material of all kinds that will be off putting for many viewers. Technical merits are generally strong and the supplementary commentaries quite interesting for those considering a purchase.