DEMON CITY SHINJUKU is a highly imaginative Japanese animation adult horror-fantasy film that was originally released in 1993. The film features highly stylized animation character and background designs created by Director Yoshiaki Kawajiri (director of WICKED CITY and NINJA SCROLL). Together with the creative team of Hideyuki Kikuchi (VAMPIRE HUNTER D), Masao Maruyama (DEVIL HUNTER YOHKO), and Naoyuki Onda, the filmmaking team create an epic tale of hell on earth and the invasion of demons. The story mixes in elements of DEMONS and HIGHLANDER, and takes place in the near future.

The animation is not AKIRA quality, but it’s close. The shadow detail on the characters faces in excellent and very realistic. The backgrounds and exteriors are full of detail. The film lends itself to re-viewings simply for the reason that you cannot catch everything in the initial viewing. The coloring and tints are very wild and tend to have a psychedelic effect that lends to the otherworldly feel of the film. For the purpose of this review, I viewed the English subbed version. It sounds if it was translated in the UK. Except for a few characters it is well-dubbed and the voices match the characters look. Rebi Ra’s voice is really good and sounds genuinely menacing.

With the decimated city of Shinjuku as the canvas for this struggle of good and evil, the film chronicles the exploits of the young and cocky Kyoka. He exhibits a potential for an ancient martial arts technique called Nampo (a fictional martial art science involving telekinesis and other psychic powers). When a demonic warlord named Rebi Rah, who is also a master of Nampo (and other ancient arts) shows up to hold up his end of a deal with the Devil (namely invoking the demon legions of hell to conquer Earth), Kyoka must find a way to stop Rebi Rah. But the Devil has allowed Rebi Ra to have mastery over three supernatural demons who are impervious to even nuclear weapons (or so we are told): The Spider Demon (the sickest), The Illusory Demon, and the seductive Lady Demon.

In his mission to open the demon gateway and strike fear into the Earth people, Rebi Ra captures the beloved president of the world Federation. His determined daughter, Sayaka, makes up her mind to enter the demon city to confront the powerful Rebi Ra. She recruits Kyoka, whose mastery of Nampo is growing stronger, and he reluctantly joins her on the quest. Together they brave the dangers of the demon city in order to track down the evil Rebi Ra. But to get to the powerful overlord, they must first get by the three supernatural demons from hell (among other hazards). They are joined in their mission by another mysterious individual named Mephisto, who may or may not be more dangerous than Rebi Ra himself.

The movie has some dazzling animated scenes of mayhem. Inside the demon city, Kyoka and Sayaka are confronted by a vicious two-header Doberman. Kyoka does battle with the giant Spider Demon in a subway tunnel; the creature shreds the subway car until Kyoka manages to electrocute the creature using the third rail. Kyoka is attacked by the Illusory Demon and we witness psychedelic animated sequences during the attack. The Spider Demon bloodily chops the two-headed Doberman in half. In an abandoned bar, the Lady Demon attempts to seduce Mephisto and drools sulphuric acid onto him; he reacts by shoving a bottle of alcohol down her throat (quickie science lesson: alcohol and sulfuric acid don’t mix). Rebi Ra creates a giant pentagram to summon the demons by using the ruins and dilapidated buildings.

SIGHT

The transfer is presented full frame (1.33.1), and I believe that’s how the film was originally released in 1993. The image is very sharp with superior detail. Colors are genuinely bright and appear accurate. Contrast and brightness are good with excellent shadow detail. There is no bleeding between colors and no artifacts were observed. The blacks are deep and solid. Due to the ‘demonology’ theme of the film, there are a lot of devilish hues of red, blue, and pink. These hues and the psychedelic effect of the color and artwork are done justice by this DVD transfer.

SOUND

The audio is Dolby Digital Stereo surround, and it is a strong mix. The audio across the front soundstage is very good and features a lot of directionality and bass. The rears supplement this with crisp ambience and some reverb. The voices come mostly from the center speaker and are very clear. They did a good job with the dubbing, surprisingly, although a couple characters sound forced and unreal. Luckily, they are not the main characters are only in the movie for a few moments. There are two negative things about the soundtrack I want to address. Firstly, the bass is real good throughout except for a few scenes involving crashes and explosions. They should have cranked up the bass up for these scenes, instead it seems to be missing. It appears this is not the result of the authoring, rather it’s the master which is the sources of the problem. The other disappointing thing is the score. Instead of going with a traditional symphonic score, the filmmakers decided to employ a synthesized electronic score. The result is it sounds like background music for a video game. But this won’t ruin the movie for you as the music is used sparingly. Overall, a solid soundtrack (for DD 2.0) that will shake your foundations.

FEATURES

Character Gallery and Supernatural Beasts are submenus that identify the central characters/monsters and provide actual chapter jumps to their respective introductory scenes: Kyoka, Sayaka, Rebi Ra, Master Rai, Spider Demon, Illusory Demon, and Lady Demon.

There are trailers for BIG WARS, GRAPPLER BAKI, AYANE'S HIGH KICK, LEGEND OF LEMNEAR, and IRIA:ZEIRAM THE ANIMATION. In the DVD Sneak Peaks menu, you can view each trailer individually, or there is an option for viewing all 5 sneak peaks chronologically. All trailers are full frame. There is no trailer included for DEMON CITY SHINJUKU.

CONCLUSION

If you are a fan of this film, you’ll never see it looking any better than on this DVD. Or if you are sick of low-budget horror flicks with plastic teenagers, you might want to rent this for something different. It’s not a real horrifying film, but it has truly awesome imagery and would make for a good Halloween treat. CPM has done a nice job with the video and audio, and they are getting better with the menu systems and extras. With the violence, nudity, and vulgar language, this is one animated feature that is not for kids.

DEMON CITY SHINJUKU is available from DVDEmpire.com

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