Yo, they must be zombies.
Zombies…You mean the Living Dead?

I had to start off with this quote for two reasons. The first reason is that this quote captures the atmosphere of this movie. The second reason is that I was intrigued by the amount of times that this flick had the word “yo” in it. In the movie's defense though, it does have subtitles, and maybe the true meaning of the words got lost in translation. Anyway, enough shit, let’s get on with the review!

First of all, this is a Japanese movie. They have a quirkier sense of humor then we do, and they make movies with subtitles. Incidentally, they also have Japanese subtitles for whenever somebody speaks English, which happens periodically.

The movie starts out in a laboratory. An American doctor and nurse are performing tests on this hotass naked Asian babe. They inject her with this drug called DNX, which is supposed to bring the dead back to life. Well, it works, and the hot babe tears the doctor’s throat out for his trouble. I won't spoil anymore of the story for you, but be certain, there are decapitations, throat impalements, tons of zombies, severed torsos, blood, guts, bullets, vomit, and, quite possibly one of the weirdest things I have seen, a zombie who was eating away on his own guts! Sheer genius!

There is enough gore and violence in this movie to go around. The effects are great. You will not be left wanting more. The body count is fairly high. Fans of nudity also have something to cheer about. You have the aforementioned naked, hotass Asian babe running around. Plus you are treated to a back view of a different hotass topless babe. It is pretty much a tease, but it is done quite nicely.

The atmosphere and setting are both adequate. About eighty percent of the movie is inside an abandoned army base, so most of the movie is in less lit settings. This does not take away from the film at all, however.

The acting is also good, but even if it wasn’t, it is hard to tell because of the language barrier. There is a little overacting going on with the bravado of some of the gangsters. Some would call it cheesy, but I just call it cool, daddy-O.

To summarize, this is a great zombie movie with all the zombie basics. Expect no more. It comes complete with the prerequisite abandoned army base, and that one military guy who can’t act worth a shit and you are left wondering how the hell he got into the movie.

If you are into the old school, one-dimensional (not a bad thing) zombie classics, you need to go purchase Junk. Renting is not enough. If you are not into this sort of thing, then you might think the movie is one-dimensional and not very original. Your loss.

This review was inspired by the rage that I felt when I wrote this review originally last week. I forgot to save it, and ended up losing it all. Boy was I pissed!

A group of young gem thieves call up the local Yakuza scumbag to arrange a meeting to exchange their loot for cash, in what immediately looks like a very obvious double cross. The Yakuza scumbag gets to choose the meeting place, and it just so happens to be at an abandoned military base in the middle of nowhere. The one place in all of Japan where a mysterious re-animating agent called DNX was researched.

The major thing I look forward to seeing in any zombie flick is how or why the filmmakers are going to make the dead return to life. And as lame and convenient as it was in Junk, it did make me smile. Let’s face it when was the last time you saw a well thought and original reason for re-animated corpses? Well Junk is no exception, just so happens that a shootout goes down in a room filled with a shitload of corpses…..also stored in the very same room? You guessed it, massive amounts of the DNX re-animating agent in easily broken or knocked over containers.

It was enjoyable to say the least, and Payne couldn’t have been more accurate by saying it was “old school, one-dimensional.” The gore was well done more often than not, and quite plentiful. The super intelligent naked female zombie was pretty damn hot, and never should have been allowed to “suit up” at the end of the film. Also worth noting were some major homage’s to various MEGA zombie blockbusters:

• The DNX re-agent was fluorescent green (not glow-in-the-dark however) = Re-Animator
• The style in which the corpses were wrapped in linen and rope = Romero’s Dawn of the Dead
• Splintered wood, neck impalement = Fulci
• Theme music during re-animation theme = Return of the Living Dead
• Maggot/worm infested zombie eye sockets = Fulci

Junk was also wrought with some other problems I couldn’t overlook though. The acting and dialog of the American cast members (dubbed or not) was awful! The Colonel in particular usually didn’t make eye contact; he acted as though his cue card was stapled to his co-star’s chest. They used the fucking kitty-cat “jump scare” which I’m so tired of. The character Akira screams loudly throughout the movie with a bit too much zeal (this is definitely a Japanese thing, they do take pride in their screaming) But most of all, there’s a part, where a character finally escapes the zombie infested base and sees two military guys running in armed to the teeth, he then mutters “Why is the military here?” Lessee, you just walked out of a military base that’s infested with zombies, why the fuck do you think they’re there?

Regardless of my ranting, the movie was enjoyable and perfectly fits my analogy of zombie movies, and that is: Zombie movies are like pizza and beer; even when they’re bad, they’re good. Recommended for fans of undead flesh eaters.

6 out of 10 zombies who don’t follow the rules of how to kill a zombie