Burst City (1982): A Punk Prodigy

Burst City (1982) bursts through the screen with high-octane energy in a frenzy of fight scenes and anarchy. While I have no idea what I just watched, I do know that Burst City and I are now in a relationship. This insane film creates what would one day become the MTV aesthetic and does so the same year MTV launches with Video Killed The Radio Star. The MTV style would be known for quick cutting, mixed media, and flashy camera-work; however, it would soon be seen as style merely for the sake of style. Michael Bay would build his filmography upon this idea of no substance or little substance with a shiny ribbon. But here, pre-dating all of that is a strange Japanese punk film.

I can now up my hipster game / pretentiousness by creating a Spotify list devoted to early 1980’s Japanese Punk. Here is said mix. The punk rock in this film is incredible. By 1982 we had Dead Kennedys, Bad Brains, Misfits, Descendants, Black Flag, The Replacements, The Cramps, Circle Jerks, The Damned, The Clash, Buzzcocks, Ramones, and The Stooges which are all legends. Burst City introduces us to a few new acts: The Roosters, The Rockers, 1984, and The Stalin. The music from these bands infects the film.

Burst City oozes cool by breaking free from cinematic rules to birth it’s style. The anarchy of pastiche parallels the narrative where the core idea is to destroy the class system that has imposed dullness in the future. Youth culture is to set fire to the authority that refuses to allow them agency. The film, in and of itself, attempts to destroy modernism and breathe life into post-modernism and deconstruction. The black and white cinema verité style mixed with concert footage, grainy 16mm riot footage, sped up and slowed down sequences, still frames, rapid cut editing, un-natural lighting, and melodramatic acting come together as a punk cinematic symphony.

 Burst City’s director, Sogo Ishii, introduced punk to Japanese cinema via Panic High School (1978) and Crazy Thunder Road (1980). The latter film included depictions of biker gangs that would inspire the original Akira manga in 1982. Punk films appeared to have their heyday in the early 1980’s. This subgenre includes Derek Jarman’s Jubilee (1978) which is often cited as the first punk film. Jubilee, while less energetic as Burst City, is a kindred spirit in its ability to create anarchy within film convention. Penelope Spheer’s punk documentary The Decline Of Western Civilization was released in 1981 and provided the blueprint for punk culture. The subgenre only blossomed. This era of punk films includes Rock 'n' Roll High School (1979), Breaking Glass (1980), Times Square (1980), Rude Boy (1980), Urgh! A Music War (1981), Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains (1982), Liquid Sky (1982), Human Highway (1982), Class of 1984 (1982), Suburbia (1983), Repo Man (1984), Class of Nuke Em High (1986), and Sid & Nancy (1986).

Even grouped with other punk films, Burst City feels dangerous. The riots feel real. The fighting doesn’t look like acting. There is a battle between two punk bands in the middle of the film that elicits a jawdrop from the start of the sequence to its finish. One band attacks another band during their set and while punches are being thrown and equipment damaged, members of the battling bands decide to keep playing as the fight rages on. This action captures the absurdity of the moment. We are reminded repeatedly that we are witnesses to chaos. When a businessman discovers one of his clients has murdered his love, the businessman kills the client and cradles his murdered love. This scene isn’t necessarily groundbreaking, but Ishii stays with the businessman as he mourns his loss, screams out, kicks the wall, holds the body tight, and cries. This moment lingers. In a film of quick movements, we stay here to let this feeling sink in. Only after this can the movie erupt.

 To say this film spirals out of control leaves you believing that control ever existed; however, even the chaos you’ve become accustom to, disappears to service an additional level of anarchy. There is a raw, kinetic energy that shoves one frame into the next. And these are by far the prettiest punks you’ll ever see. None of these glam-rock faces deserve the police issued grenade launchers directed at them in the final riot. This punk prodigy has it all. Without spoiling anything, because there isn’t a plot, the film ends with one of the toughest punks donning a pre-Iron Man cosplay and his screaming mute boyfriend riding off into the night together on their dystopian motorcycle with sidecar. This is an image that burns into the rebel that resides within all of us.