Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie Review

Does this movie pack any bite?

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 4, 2011

Have you ever noticed how in horror movies people seem to run toward danger? It seems to be the same sort of logic that propels people in action-adventure films like swashbucklers to always go up any nearby object—you know, mast, wall, anything vertical—so that they can then fall spectacularly to their deaths. Most people would probably not book an immediate voyage to a place called Vampire Island, especially when they’ve been forewarned that the place has earned its name for good reason. But then of course there would be no shrieks of terror, insane chase scenes, exploding heads, and various ghosties and ghoulies that do a fair amount more than merely go bump in the night, all staples of the horror genre, and all utilized with varying degrees of success throughout Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island. The film actually gets off to a fun and relatively fresh start as a terrified man runs through a moonlit forest, obviously being chased by some nefarious entity. Like any good victim in any given horror film, the man manages to get himself trapped in a building with no easy escape route, and seems about to become fodder for attacking vampires until a samurai-esque hero bursts into view and quickly dispatches the blood suckers with appropriate aplomb. This opening sequence is both scary and funny, as various vampire heads get smashed and squished with some great sound effects. Unfortunately things get at least a bit more predictable once Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island settles down into its main storyline. We soon meet Akira (Asian heartthrob Hideo Ishiguro), a sweet natured high school kid who is obviously nowhere near the top of the totem pole in terms of popularity or social cachet. Running to escape a marauding bunch of goons who evidently want to teach Akira some kind of violent lesson, he escapes into the waiting arms (and hotel room) of a mysterious older woman named Rei (Asami Mizukawa). Akira and his small coterie of fellow geeks are soon ensconced in a vampire attack as well as Rei’s confession that she is a recent escapee from Vampire Island. She further reveals that Akira’s missing older brother Atsushi (Dei Watanabe, son of iconic actor Ken Watanabe) is on the island battling the vampires and needs help (and of course it doesn’t take rocket scientist—or fearless vampire killer—to figure out he was the rescuer seen in the opening sequence).

Akira and his nerdy allies of course instantly decide to all accompany Rei back to Vampire Island, and any lover of horror film cliché is going to know right off the bat (and/or fang) that what we’re about to witness is the slow and steady attrition of our putative heroes at the hands (and/or teeth) of the relentless vampires. So the issue becomes, how artful is the basic predictability handled. And the good news is that under the direction of South Korean director Tae-gyum Kim, things are both appropriately Gothic as well as steeped in a sort of quasi-Samurai ethos that provides a lot of opportunity for some extremely well staged battle sequences. While some astute viewers may compare Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island to Battle Royale, the film in its own peculiar way is just as redolent of the Skull Island sequence of King Kong, and in fact Vampire Island itself bears a certain resemblance to Skull Island. Both islands of course feature horrific creatures who are out to consume the denizens of the place, and both feature terrified survivors doing their utmost to make sure that they aren’t the next main course served up to their home world’s predators.

This film’s Fay Wray, as it were, is Akira’s would be girlfriend Yuki (Maori Takimoto), who is of course abducted right off the bat, forcing Akira to become more heroic than is perhaps his natural bent. The group of mainland (if Japan can indeed be termed a mainland) friends make their way through that same gloomy forest seen in the early sequence as they come into contact with various vampires, many of whom almost seem like they are part of some errant Kabuki troupe who just happen to include blood sucking in their theatrical repertoire. Ultimately Akira is up against the Vampire King, and of course he is also desperate to find and help his brother. So many people in calamitous straits, so little time.

As predictable as the through line of Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island undeniably is (and there are probably very few who won’t guess most if not all of the major plot points minutes before they actually happen), the film is brisk, beautifully filmed and features some appealing CGI which ups the special effects cachet of the enterprise considerably. Lots of films emphasize style over substance, and that’s inarguably the case here with Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island. Sometimes it’s not always the story that’s as important as the style in which it’s told, and while the basic plot here is about as cliché-ridden as they come, Kim invests his film with a lot of flash and panache, keeping it entertaining if never very innovative.

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island is presented on Blu-ray with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.35:1. This is an often very sumptuous looking film, filled with ice cold blue and blue-grey filtering that casts an appropriately gloomy and Gothic hue to the proceedings. While this intentional filtering skews "normal" colors, often quite considerably, the film still boasts impressive saturation and a surprising amount of fine detail, especially considering the fact that this blue-grey color scheme, so often employed in thrillers and horror films, often robs the image of fine detail. The CGI elements look nicely sharp and well detailed, and though the film is bathed in almost nonstop darkness (sunlight, after all, isn't too healthy for vampires), Higanjami: Escape from Vampire Island has very solid black levels and excellent shadow detail.

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island offers two lossless tracks, both Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mixes, one in the original Japanese and the other a pretty listless and forgettable English dub. The English dub features less than stellar voice work, as well as some oddly asynchronous dialogue which doesn't even come close to matching the lip movements of the actors, and so only those who absolutely can't stand reading subtitles should deign to sample it. The good news is that the Japanese track offers a lot of great sonic activity, including very consistent use of surround channels. The film is awash in inventive sound effects from the very first sequence when everything from the squishing of a vampire head to the quicksilver sound of a blade coming out of its sheath is very well represented. Dialogue is always clear and the entire soundtrack is very artfully prioritized, with a number of very involving and immersive sound effects regularly surrounding the listener. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range is wide and very appealing.

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Making of Higanjima (SD; 45:07), despite being a fairly typical EPK-fest, actually has some interesting footage in it, including a prayer ritual the cast and crew participated in before filming began. Maybe it helped to ward off vampires.
• Original Trailer (SD; 2:02)

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Higanjima: Escape from Vampire Island may simply recycle any number of old ideas and vampire clichés, but it at least has the good sense to present its clichés with a lot of visual flair. This is a very quick moving enterprise, which means even the stereotypical characters and plot motifs fly by rather fleetly, and so while there may be nothing here to get really excited about, it at least doesn't dawdle, which is often half the battle. The film loses some momentum about halfway through, and it oddly decides not to continue mining the perhaps unintended comic elements that are nonetheless quite evident in the opening sequence. Performances are strong, if somewhat hammy, but it's the film's look that offers the most compelling argument for visiting Vampire Island. If you're a fan of this kind of fare, especially as Hallowe'en approaches, you could do worse. There's nothing new or innovative about this film, but on style points alone, it comes Recommended.