This movie begins with the United States Army conducting an experiment consisting of bringing a beautiful Japanese woman named "Kyoko" (Miwa) back to life. What the scientists don't count upon is the fact that they have created a zombie who cannot be controlled. Not long afterward some jewel thieves agree to meet some members of the Yakuza to sell their goods at the same abandoned warehouse where this experiment was conducted. The negotiations break down and both factions end up battling each other for the jewels which results in a chemical spill that creates even more zombies. Complete chaos soon follows. Anyway, while this is clearly a low-budget film I thought the director (Atsushi Muroga) did a fairly competent job up until about the last 20 minutes or so. Things got a bit silly after that. In any case, the premise was pretty good and I liked the presence of both Kaori Shimamura (as "Saki") along with the aforementioned Miwa. But because of the breakdown at the end I have to rate it as slightly below average.

This was a pretty cool Asian zombie movie.The deal is a group of thieves rob a jewelery store, and go to a remote warehouse to sell it. Unfortunately for them, the warehouse is a secret US Government experiment lab, and a re-animated corpses is on the loose inside.One thing I did like was the amount of gore i.e a hell of a lot. There are many the shootings, disembowellings, maggots, and the red stuff spurted everywhere. The plot is also a nice way to set up the inevitable 'escape from the building" scenario.Things I disliked included the fact that some of the special effects looked a little fake, which was a shame considering how good the gore was, and the fact that I knew exactly who would survive 20 minutes in. But hey, that's the zombie conventions fault, not mine.Overall, this was an enjoyable zombie movie, but like most other zombie movies, seen one, seen them all.7/10

I like zombie movies, and I like Japanese movies, but this one was just too amateurish. The acting went from bad to worse, at times getting so bad you couldn't concentrate on the movie - you had to stop and marvel at a line delivered particularly badly, wondering why it wasn't edited out and if that actor was possibly a funding source for the movie. To be fair, the Japanese actors, in general, did a much better job than their American counterparts.For a better example of the Japanese zombie movie, see Bio Zombie. That at least has a decent level of humor. Junk had little to no humor, indicating that they took the movie a little too seriously. It wasn't so bad that I couldn't finish watching, but it was so bad I knew I'd never watch it again.

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.