Uriah43 While in a fight with her psychotic and cannibalistic mother, "Kika" (Yumiko Hara) has her heart ripped out at the exact same time a meteorite hits both her and her mother "Rikka" (Eihi Shiina). Both are essentially wrapped in a strange cocoon and frozen in time. Meanwhile the ash from the meteorite blankets a certain portion of Japan and those who breathe it are turned into zombie-like creatures about an hour later. What then transpires is a bizarre political debate on how to treat these infected people with one side arguing that they should be killed and the other side demanding that they be protected. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie I will just say that this particular type of film apparently appeals to a certain niche of movie-goers who really enjoy action and gore regardless of how ridiculous some of the scenes turn out to be. And there were more than a few ridiculous scenes in this movie. Naturally, this movie was never meant to be taken seriously but even so the continuous action and gore got more than a little annoying. Again, those who enjoy action and gore to the exclusion of everything else will probably love this movie. But I am not one them and I have rated it accordingly. Awful.

Alucard Venom I love Asian cinema. I love gore from time to time, but I am not big fan of gory flicks.... but this one is damn entertaining. Fans of the genre will surely love it (as well as gorehounds) but other more mainstream audiences will hate it and get confused most of the time."Helldriver" is what could be considered "new wave of Japanese grindhouse" and it has everything good grindhouse needs: little to no story, weird moments, lot of gore, violence and blood. There's not much nudity in this one, but gore and blood splatters go over the top in every possible way.Plot is rather simple: meteor (!?) falls to Earth, turning nearly all people in Japan into some kind of zombie mutants. Kika (Yumiko Hara) is sent to chop the heck out of them and kill mutant leader. Other folks join her in her mission. Now, first part of the movie is bit awkward (in a good) way, having nice amount of social\ politics\religious satire (but gore and action scenes still happen here) and somewhere around the half of the movie, title shows up (not kidding). After that, the movie "really" begins, which is pretty much hack'n'slash after that.What makes HELLDRIVER great is that movie doesn't take itself very seriously (I was laughing most of the time, even in bloodiest scenes), gore FX are well done, and what impresses me the most are makeup effects on some "boss" monsters. I swear, at least half of the budget must have gone on makeup and fake blood (and this movie has insane amount of blood, maybe even more then Peter Jackson's "Braindead"). Some really cool villains (and original) and great fight scenes (and hilarious at the same time!) with them. Most of the time you'll keep asking yourself "how the heck they are gonna top the last scene" in terms of (un)logic, visuals and action.Yumiko Hara is also very pretty and looks like Japanese action heroine. Hope we'll see more of her in future. Eihi Shiina (from Tokyo Gore Police, Audition) plays main villain, and she's wonderful as usual. Her scenes are over the top most of the time, but they fit movie perfectly, since Helldriver itself is way over the top in every possible element.Turn off your logic and remember "it's just a movie". Enjoy the mayhem that happens on screen, and you'll surely like Helldriver.

Paul Magne Haakonsen I was so excited when I found out about this movie on Amazon, and I ordered it immediately as it was available, so I managed to acquire a 2-disc DVD version of it. Why was I excited you might ask? Well because it is a zombie movie, a Japanese movie and it has Eihi Shiina in it; three good things put together.As with the recent releases of gore movies from Japan, you know what you are in for with this movie as well. And true enough, "Helldriver" is in the likes of "Tokyo Gore Police", "Meatball Machine", etc. There is an excessive amount of blood and gore from the very start till end here (so now you are warned). And also there is a lot of questionable effects, but you bear over with it because of the gore and absurdity of the whole movie. This is what Japanese gore movies is all about after all.The story told in "Helldriver" is just as weird as the rest of the movie. Kika (played by Yumiko Hara) is abused by her mother, watching her father killed before her very eyes, and she have her heart ripped out by her mother. Then things take a turn for the extreme, yeah as if this wasn't absurd enough. Something from space strikes down the mother, and half of Japan is covered by a strange cloud, turning people into ravenous zombies. Kika is recovered by the Japanese government, "improved" and put back out to deal with the zombie invasion in the north and put the Zombie Queen to rest."Helldriver" has questionable acting at times, but the overall acting performance was adequate for this particular type of movie. So you come to accept the odd acting and over-dramatized situations from time to time.I found "Helldriver" to be good enough entertainment, as I knew what to expect and had braced myself beforehand. Take this for what it is, gory entertainment that is almost as far from being realistic as it can get. This is a movie after all, meant to entertain, not meant to mirror our daily lives.If you don't like gore movies, the extreme splatter movies that Japan have spawned in the recent years, then stay well clear of "Helldriver", because it will not be in your liking. If you are a gorehound and enjoy these over-the-top Japanese splatterfests, then sink your teeth into "Helldriver", because it is as gore-drenched as many of the previous movies of the same genre.The only thing that was a disappointment for me was that Eihi Shiina didn't have as much time on the screen as I would have liked. But that is a matter of personal preference. And also being a huge fan of the zombie genre, I did found this whole antler-thing on the heads of the zombies to be a bit weird. But I accepted it as part of the movie, and also because it did fit well enough into the absurdity of this particular movie and genre.

benjamindbennett Okay, when you go to see a so-bad-it's-good horror/zombie movie, there are a few expectations that need to be met and I could never get past the fact that the act of watching zombies getting killed wasn't amusing. Seriously. The movie used thousands of liters of blood and all too often watching it spray was not remotely funny. The movie delivers on a lot of fronts, but at the end of the day there was too much gore and weird sh*t going on and not enough hilarity and cheering on the hero on screen.When I saw the movie, it was the headliner for a horror movie film festival and by all means all of the circumstances for movie success were there, but it was just one of those ineffable things where the movie just didn't live up to the expectations.tl;dr Had potential, but not as entertaining/lighthearted as it should have been