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What is “Tokyo Gore Style”?

“Tokyo Gore Style” refers to a fairly recent offshoot of Japanese filmmaking defined by excessive amounts of gore and splatter, kinetic, rapid-fire editing, and a distinct preoccupation with “body horror”–particularly the transformation of the body into organic weaponry–that harkens back to Japanese “cyberpunk” classics of the late 80′s and early 90′s like Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989) and 964 Pinocchio (1991), as well as V-cinema releases like Cyclops (1987), Conton (1987), and Biotherapy (1986).  The ”Tokyo Gore” part of the name is derived from the film Tokyo Gore Police (2008), as it provides the best example of the subgenre.

What sets the style apart from other types of Japanese “shock” filmmaking is a strong undercurrent of jet-black humor that keeps the violence from becoming particularly disturbing to the viewer.  The bloodshed is so exaggerated that it is more comical than shocking.

Examples of “Tokyo Gore Style” films (permanent link availability not guaranteed):

Meatball Machine (2005) (English subtitles) - Yūdai Yamaguchi

Tokyo Gore Police (2008) (English subtitles) - Yoshihiro Nishimura

The Machine Girl (2008) (English subtitles) - Noboru Iguchi

Oppai Chanbara: Striptease Samurai (2008) (Japanese - no subtitles) - Akira Hirose

Onechanbara: The Movie (2008) (English subtitles) - Yôhei Fukuda

Onechanbara: The Movie - Vortex (2009) - Tsuyoshi Shôji

Hard Revenge, Milly (2008) (English subtitles) - Takanori Tsujimoto

Hard Revenge, Milly: Bloody Battle (2009) - Takanori Tsujimoto

RoboGeisha (2009) (English subtitles) - Noboru Iguchi

Samurai Princess (2009) - Kengo Kaji

Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl (2009) (Optional English subtitles) - Yoshihiro Nishimura, Naoyuki Tomomatsu

Helldriver (2010) (English subtitles) - Yoshihiro Nishimura

Gothic & Lolita Psycho (2010) - Go Ohara

Big Tits Zombie (2010) (English subtitles) - Takao Nakano

Mutant Girls Squad (2010) (English subtitles) - Yoshinori Chiba

Alien vs Ninja (2010) (English dubbed) - Seiji Chiba, Yuji Shimomura

Deadball (2011) - Yūdai Yamaguchi

Yakuza Weapon (2011) (English subtitles) - Tak Sakaguchi, Yūdai Yamaguchi