BA_Harrison I like Junk: sure, it's extremely derivative stuff (female super-zombie aside, of course), but it has absolutely no pretensions, delivering fans of your more traditional shuffling undead all the gut-munching, brain-blasting action that they could ask for.The plot sees a gang of amateur jewel thieves (including sexy getaway driver Saki) bite off more than they can chew when they arrange their meeting with a Yakuza fence and his men at an abandoned factory: the derelict building is, in fact, a top secret army base where experiments in raising the dead have resulted in flesh-eating zombies, and it's not long before the criminals are fighting for their lives against hordes of mouldy walking cadavers.This weak set up is simply an excuse for a series of violent gun-fights and bloody encounters with manky zombies, so it is easy to forgive the silly script, many glaring plot-holes and terrible acting (particularly from a handful of westerners, playing US Army dudes). Director Atsushi Muroga (who also directed jewellery-heist-gone-wrong action flick Score) wisely keeps the action flowing thick and fast, and ensures that gore-hounds are kept happy with plenty of splattery effects.Eventually, things get very daft indeed, with the aforementioned super-zombie stealing the show in the film's finale: wearing thigh high kinky boots, this surprisingly sexy corpse runs rings around the surviving gang members, before being shot in the head. Unfortunately, this only makes matters worse: the she-zombie becomes even stronger (and, inexplicably, albino!), fighting on after having been completely cut in half!!!Cool, crazy, and covered in blood, this undemanding undead actioner is recommended to those who want to switch off their brain and simply enjoy some gory mayhem.

Paul Andrews Junk: Shiryo-Gari starts in an American Army laboratory where evil scientist Doctor Kinderman fills a syringe up with a bright green fluid known as DNX which he injects into a corpse of a young Japanese woman named Kyoko (Miwa Yanagizawa) who then comes back to life & bites a large chunk out of Kinderman's neck. Three men, Akira (Shu Ehara), Jun (Nobuyuki Asano) & Kabu enter a jewellery store & rob it but Akira is stabbed in the foot. They flee the store & to their getaway van driven by a woman named Saki (Kaori Shimamura) who speeds off, Jun contacts his Yakuza contact Ramon (Tate Gouta) who arrange to meet in an abandoned factory on the outskirts of the city. Meanwhile Doctor Takashi Nikada has been summoned to U.S. Army base to see Colonel McGriff who asks him to help cover up Doctor Kinderman's experiments which he help start & the Military have been carrying on. Back at the factory Jun, Akira, Kabu, Saki, Ramon & his bodyguards quickly discover that they are not as alone as they first thought when they are attacked by rotting flesh-eating zombies. They are forced to fight the zombies as they try to escape with their lives & the 100,000,000 Yen worth of stolen jewellery...This Japanese horror film was co-written & directed by Atsushi Muroga & I was somewhat disappointed by it. The script by Muroga, J.B. Baker, Yoko Kuzuki & Emiko Terao doesn't make the most of it's promising sounding premise that tries to mix horror & action. It's quite slow to get going & the zombies are some of the worst in film history. They look poor with unconvincing make-up & they move so slowly there is simply no threat there whatsoever, I won't even call it walking because they they more shuffle & I was frustrated that the clichéd 'just have your actor stand there & scream until the zombies catch up' trick is constantly used, why don't they just RUN away? I was screaming at the screen for these idiots to just outrun these pathetic zombies. The characters are threadbare & unlikable the babe of a zombie in leather apart, the plot is full of holes that you could drive a double-decker bus through & any decent ideas Junk: Shiryo-Gari does have it rips off from better zombie films like the American Military involvement from The Return of the Living Dead (1985), the ultra slow zombies from Zombi 2 (1979) & an almost identical scene when a woman is holding a door shut with a piece of furniture & a zombies fingers poke round the door & Night of the Living Dead (1968) style intestine eating & only a bullet to the head will kill them & the bright green re-animation serum stolen from Re-Animator (1985). Junk: Shiryo-Gari feels like an American film using Japanese locations & actors & there is nothing original here. Technically the film is very basic with flat extremely grainy cinematography, mixed special effects, bland production design being set almost completely in an old factory & lacklustre unexciting direction. Director Muroga fails to film any of the films set pieces with flare, pace or originality. The gore was disappointing, a splinter of wood (Zombi 2 rip off again?) is forced through someones throat, there are a couple of intestine eating scenes, a few gory gunshot wounds, a decapitated head & ripped off hand & someone cut in half. The make up effects aren't particularly impressive & the zombies look really poor except that is Kyoko who for some reason looks perfectly human, can talk & can change the colour of her hair in the blink of an eye! She also has a nice sexy line in leather outfits & thigh high boots & is probably worth a couple of stars on her own & is quite possibly the sexiest zombie in horror film history. The acting isn't great as far as I can tell but it's all in Japanese so who can tell? There's a bit of a buzz about Asian horror at the moment with Ringu (1998), Ju-On: The Grudge (2003) & Dark Water (2002) all getting big budget Hollywood remakes but that doesn't automatically mean all Asian horror is good & Junk: Shiryo-Gari isn't, good that is. Do yourself a favour & avoid this, there are much better horror films, much better zombie films & much better Asian films worthy of your attention. The best thing I can say about it is that it provides a reasonable amount of entertainment once it gets going but ultimately it didn't impress me that much.

veganflimgeek JunkBefore considering with you should give 91 minutes of your life to junk you need ask yourself why you watch zombie movies. If you love the Romero zombie movies for there sly commentary hidden in a nightmarish vision well don't bother. If you are a splatter fan that doesn't really mind little things like plot, acting or a budget on a film Junk is your ticket! It all comes down to what you are looking for in a zombie film.In fangoria the director stated that From dusk til dawn was a big influence and you can see that in how the film is structured. The plot starts off with little to do with zombies but with Japanese gangsters and thieves involved in a jewelry heist. To bad they intend to sell the jewels on the site of factory where Japanese scientists and the U.S. military develop Herbert west's special sauce for undead making.Boy this is one bad zombie movie. Of course that maybe exactly what you are looking for. I can respect what was done for the money that they had. Some moments are sorta effective.****spoilers****On to the spoiler comments. Naked zombies, only the lead woman zombie. If she is intelligent enough to turn off the nuclear warhead(connected to a pretty chaeap-ass looking PC) I think she could have mastered getting some attire. When the Japanese scientist realizes the intelligent zombie is his wife I understand why the director choose to flash to pictures of them happy. I am not sure why he continued to after she started trying to eat his flesh.The character Akira, had his foot stabbed but after 20 minutes it seems to have healed. And the American `actors'…Christ. How wooden could they make dialogue. All that being said Junk is ok considering what amount of money it was made with.

rustyangel13 JUNK: I don't know if it's just me or if it's the constant bombardment of the Asian movies that I watch but I have to admit to the world that I'm a 100% sucker for horror movies where Japanese women are covered in blood and scream in terror. There's nothing sexier to me than a gorgeous tan-skinned, black-haired, dark-eyed Japanese girl caught in the grip of terror or in the midst of a life-or-death situation. And with that being said, this is why I'd rank this Japanese zombie gore, splat-a-minute fiasco alot higher than it really should be. It's a cheezy, bad-acted (especially with the Americans), easy to read plot, direct to video type of "cheap thrill" flick that does little for the "zombie" genre but to add to the encyclopedia of undead munchings and entrail scarfings. It smacks of LUCIO FULCI's Italian gore-fest masterpiece, ZOMBI and owes alot to the camp classic, RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD. But what's nice about all this, is that it SHOWS so we're not bogged down with it trying to be something that it's not. We're NOT going to compare this to GEORGE ROMERO's epic "life beyond death" series of films, that's for damn sure. Director MUROGA ATSUSHI knew what he liked and gave us a film that longtime zombie fans (like myself) would grow to expect and wouldn't be dissappointed to see. It's predictable, yes, but it's great fun none-the-less. Saki (actress KAORI SHIMAMURA) and Akira (actor OSAM EBARA) are two of four jewelry thieves who's recent heist brings them into dealings with the Yakuza kingpin, Ramon (actor TATE GOUTA). Their staged meeting place just happens to be an undercover military warehouse where scientific experiments to bring the recently deceased back to life are taking place. And you guessed it, the experiments go wrong and the living dead are unleashed onto the gangsters, the robbers, and the military as well. Using a neon green liquid (ala STUART GORDON and H.P. LOVECRAFT's RE-ANIMATOR) called DNX to bring the dead back to life, Doctor Jun (actor ASANO NOBUYUKI) admits his involvement in the program to hopefuly bring his wife, Kyoko (played by the constant nude actress MIWA) back from the beyond. From here, it's a hour of running from the undead, catching a glimpse of a few moist zombie picnics, getting in a lucky head shot or two, and ALOT of screaming! What else could you possibly want from a zombie flick, huh? But in it's defense to set itself apart from the others, there are two scenes that really stand out in my opinion where it really shines. First, when Saki finds her buddy getting the chowdown from a pack of zombies, she hollers out "They must be zombies! Let's get outta here!" and that's something you'd think people in those kinds of situations would realize. How many movies have we seen where they sit there and pretend that this can't be happening and that there has to be another reason for all this madness?! The second, and most distinguishing scene is where Doctor Jun meets his wife, Kyoko for the first time after she's been turned, and well, it's just great filmmaking there. Nice acting, nice setting, nice music, just a perfect movie moment, even when she goes "super freak" All in all, a pretty damn good movie experience. The import PAL Region 2 DVD was rather expensive (about $30) but I'm certainly glad I got the chance to see it and I would NEVER do without it being in my collection.