[HorrorScience] Demon City Shinjuku (1988)

After commenting on the anime of Frankenstein and that of Dracula, I think it's a good idea to continue with animated films that have a terrifying theme (or at least include monsters and typical horror movie elements).

In my search for movies of this style, I found an anime called Demon City Shinjuku (Makai Toshi Shunjuku in Japanese) that appeared in 1988 and had some international distribution (it even arrived dubbed in Spain) in the 90s. Curiously, and despite my interest in anime and monster movies, I never knew of its existence at the time, and I found it by chance recently.

The film begins with a duel to the death between Genichiro and Rebi Ra (or Lebi Ra), two former companions who were trained by Master Rai to use his inner power (known as Nempo). Unfortunately, Lebi Ra was carried away by envy when he saw that others had more power than him, and decided to make a pact with the demons: offer them the land in exchange for almost unlimited power. Genichiro will do everything possible to stop his former companion but will die in the attempt, after which Lebi Ra will unleash his wrath in the middle of the city, almost completely destroying it, driving the survivors crazy and filling it with demons, earning him the nickname Demon City or Monster City.

A decade later, a beloved president (who is trying to bring peace to the world) is attacked by demons live (the bouquet of roses they give him when he arrives in Japan turns out to be a monster that traps him). Only the intervention of the old master Rai can keep the president alive, but that makes him unable to confront his former evil student, who is still hiding somewhere in Demon City.

Rai will decide to contact Kyoya, the son of the deceased Genichiro, who was trained as a child, until the disappearance of his father, which gives him the ability to master the power of Nempo in a limited way. Unfortunately, Kyoya does not have the determination or courage to go to Demon City to face Lebi Ra, so only the intervention of Sayaka (the president's daughter) will change his mind.

Once they arrive at Demon City, they find a decaying city, with people living in ruins, hidden monsters that devour the absent-minded, criminals roaming freely, and even spirits of those who died during the destruction of the city.

In the midst of this chaos, Kyoya and Sayaka will meet Chibi (a homeless boy used to surviving in the terrible city) and Mephisto (a mysterious guy who never makes it clear if he is on the side of the demons). Lebi Ra immediately detects that something is not right and sends some demons after our heroes, although upon learning that Kyoya is Genichiro's son, he decides to torture him so that he sees the end of humanity and succumbs to the power of the demons, who will arrive to take over the earth shortly.

Lebi Ra made a pact with the demons in which he would gain power in exchange for handing over the earth to the demons in 10 years and that period of time is about to end, so Kyoya's power, Sayaka's determination and the timely intervention of Chibi and Mephisto are the only chance that humanity has before dying annihilated by the demons.

Demon City Shinjuku It's a pretty enjoyable pastime. Basically they are a bunch of action scenes (in the purest 80s anime style) joined together by small pieces of story. This means that we're not really going to see any major development in the story or the characters (well, Kyoya may mature a little during his adventure, but nothing out of the ordinary).

The best things about the film are the demons and some of the action scenes, which (as is common in anime of that time) play lightly with blood and sexuality, while offering us some absolutely exaggerated combat and some interesting animations.

Although its approach is more than correct and I liked its action scenes, after more than an hour into the movie, I started to get bored and I think that's because the story didn't give much, but even so, the movie tries to introduce elements that slightly enrich the story (some characters who live in Demon City are introduced, it talks about what happened to the souls of those who died in the city...) but in practice it's not too interesting, perhaps because you assume it's not going to work either. to be decisive in the final part of the film. I think it would have been great if they included more demons attacking the protagonists, since those scenes are where the film is most enjoyable.

In short, it is an entertaining anime, but without many pretensions, I really liked some of the fights, but it is not a film that seeks to be deep, original or go outside the box.

Curiosities:

• The film is based on a novel by Hideyuki Kikuchi, who is also the author of Vampire Hunter D.
• The story of the film was continued with other works by Hideyuki such as Demon Palace Babylon, Demon City Hunter either Demon City Blues.
• Throughout the film we can see how existing trademarks are imitated to give it a realistic touch, but changing a letter to avoid copyright problems, so we can see Kyoya training with Cola cans and Papsi posters in the ruins of the city.
• In Spain the film is known as Demon City, however there is also a VHS version called monster city.