Japan has certainly become known for its horror films, but perhaps what the country isn’t known for is its love of bingo. As one of the few forms of gambling to be permitted in Japan, alongside the likes of pachinko, bingo has become very popular in gaming halls as well as online.
As a result, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Japanese cinema concocted the novel movie Bingo, from Yôhei Fukuda, with the 2012 movie being based on a short story by writer Yusuke Yamada. However, instead of the thrills of getting the correct numbers in the classic game, having the right numbers spells doom in Bingo.
Bingo has changed drastically over the last couple of decades, and yet, at its core, it’s still the game of numbered balls that people love. This is especially true in Japan, with the online variety proving to be the major draw for bingo players.
Now, when you play online bingo games, you’re met with colorfully animated games that are filled with features and exciting graphics. You’re still looking to get your numbers virtually dabbed on your bingo sheet, but you could be hoping for a feature to trigger in a game like Age of the Gods bingo, or the jackpot to fall.
In the Japanese movie Bingo, the opposite is true. Rather than having a sheet of numbers that you’re hoping to get called, the people in the movie Bingo become the numbers and await their fate. The premise of this dark bingo game is that Japan has altered its death penalty in the future to include the families of victims, who can then play bingo to decide who of the guilty party’s relatives get executed.
Starring Sakiko Matsui (formerly of AKB48) and Kazuki Shimizu (Super Sentai series) as one of the game’s operators and a prisoner, respectively, Bingo makes even its namesake game nerve-wracking. From prisoners trembling at the sound of the ball cage turning to them having to face the victims while this torturous game plays out makes for a quintessentially Japanese horror, not unlike the recent hit series Squid Games.
A love of making the mundane horrifying
Many western horrors often run with a supernatural being suddenly presenting themselves as a threat or someone going crazy and on a killing spree. They’ve often contained films that attempt to deliver the adrenaline rush through jump scares.
By comparison, the best Japanese horror films are more nuanced, taking something mundane and turning it into a source of tension or even as a reflection of the writer’s view of society. The trailblazer of this genre to break out of Japan was Ringu, or Ring. It expertly creates tension, chills, all while playing off of the late-90s paranoia of technology, being centered on a VHS tape.
Bingo sets itself up as a way in which a futuristic Japan has brought back the death penalty. Still, in order to bring the kind of closure to victims that is very innate and even vengeance-driven, as so many people feel they desire, it incorporates the lottery game, adding tension by the bucket load. Battle Royale similarly commentates on fear of youth violence in society through a game of last-person-standing turned deadly.
Bingo truly is one of those Japanese horror gems that you should add to your watch list. It may not be the greatest of the genre, but its eerie application of the classic lottery game will have it stick in your mind forever.
