razormaid, I've thought of seeing it, but I had no idea what it was about. Thank you, I'll look into finding it.
I do know that as any movie of this gore amount, it did bring out the nutsos from their caves. I don't know from the "teachers punishing their students to the point of death" incident that you mention, but I do know of some similar things. For example, the infamous
Nevada-tan murder case shocked Japan, and was linked to Battle Royale (and put off a couple weeks the airing of the sequel, I think) because it was Nevada-tan's favorite movie.
Some other cases of bullied students killing or injuring their bullies also surfaced after Battle Royale came out. All in all, I think it was the shock many nations needed.
Regarding what you said about the States not releasing BR, it's not true that it wasn't released there because of the gore. It just wasn't released because of a series of unfortunate factors, amongst them the fact that Toei refused to pay the obscene amount of money that the american distributors were asking for, that the plot made many studios queasy, and a number of other things you can probably imagine.
I don't get why so many people didn't like the sequel. I quite frankly found it to be... enlightning might be the word. Besides, where else are you going to find another movie where 30 students die in 45 minutes?
I didn't think it was too long, and at many points I felt I could relate. Then again I live in a country in which the US holds us by the nuts for 364 days a year (we did boicott it ONE day this year...). I think it was a good way of venting my own anger at the States, through this movie.
Another thing might be that I already knew five of the actors and actresses of BR2 from some other movie or play. Miyuki Kanbe was the reason I wanted to see this movie, and I already knew Masaya Kikawada, Michiho Matsumoto, Tatsuya Fujiwara, and as much as it pains me to admit it, Nanami Oota.
