But along with the seemingly senseless violence is a meaningful message, heartfelt home life stories of the students and the fact that every death, no matter if you see it or not on-screen, strangely means something to the viewer. I think the reason for the latter is most likely the fact that the participants in the game are only young students, no older than 16. This somehow makes it sadder and more of a tragedy than if it had been a group of 40 adults. Those blood-splattered school uniforms, those innocent faces, and the fact that most of these kids didn’t ask for this in any way, serves as an example of a minority being punished for the majority’s behaviour.

On the technical side of things the film is very stylish, extremely nice to look at, bloodshed or no bloodshed. It will vary from fairly generic looking, close-up shots of the characters talking amongst one another to zoomed out shots of mountainsides and moonlit, blue-covered waves. It’s rare to find such a violent, action-centric film that’s also pleasing on the eyes.

My words can’t possibly praise this enough. It’s a fantastic film with style and substance, violence and meaning. It’s a film that should please both violence junkies and anyone looking for more substance in things. And you must admit that’s not exactly common, is it?