'Bullet Train Explosion': High-speed disaster movie doesn't get the pulse racing

Japan Times

17-04-2025

In an age of perpetual crisis, disaster movies have started to feel like a form of escapism. Sure, they depict things going horribly wrong, but they also offer hope that people might manage to overcome adversity.
There's barely a moment during Shinji Higuchi's 'Bullet Train Explosion' when you'll have reason to doubt that engineering and teamwork will ultimately save the day. Netflix's most lavish Japanese movie to date is fast and frictionless entertainment with a reassuring message that come what may, we're all in safe hands.
It's a reboot of Junya Sato's 'The Bullet Train' (1975), a classic Japanese disaster movie that sought to emulate the success of John Guillermin's 'The Towering Inferno' the previous year. As in the original, a bullet train is held to ransom with a bomb that's wired to blow if the speed drops below a certain amount — though this time it's a Hayabusa shinkansen hurtling from Shin-Aomori toward Tokyo, and the mandatory velocity has been raised to 100 kph.
While the passengers freak out or take matters into their own hands, the train's conductor, Kazuya Takaichi (Tsuyoshi Kusanagi), and his colleagues work with remarkable efficiency to devise a series of rescue efforts. Takumi Saitoh, playing the commanding officer managing the crisis, gets to deliver lines like: 'What good is government if it abandons lives in peril!' It's that kind of film.
The script is by Kazuhiro Nakagawa and Norichika Oba, both of whom worked as assistant directors with Higuchi and Hideaki Anno on the more caustic 'Shin Godzilla' (2016). They focus on the mechanics of the story — including how to link it with the events of the original movie — while wasting little time on characterization.
Machiko Ono and Jun Kaname manage to have some fun as a scandal-tainted politician and a YouTube celebrity trapped onboard the train who both seek to capitalize on the crisis. Kusanagi goes through the whole thing with the air of a religious martyr on his way to the crucifix. It's a shame that the actor is probably too old to play Jesus now: He'd be a great fit.
Whereas 1975 audiences could enjoy the incongruity of wild-man action star Shinichi 'Sonny' Chiba playing the train's driver, this time it's the single-named Non, Japanese cinema's ditziest actress. I'm not sure which prospect is scarier.
Along with Takashi Yamazaki, Higuchi has a reputation for delivering Hollywood-style bombast on a modest budget. He doesn't share Yamazaki's Spielbergian sensibilities, although this cuts both ways. 'Bullet Train Explosion' is less sentimental than the latter's 'Godzilla Minus One' (2023); it's also less exciting.
Unlike the 1975 original, the film was made with the full cooperation of the operator, East Japan Railway Company, and its marketing department. Perhaps the wild implausibility of the plot defused any worries they had about the movie inspiring copycats, which was a legitimate concern back in the 1970s.
As with Hollywood productions that enlist the help of the U.S. military, you have to wonder what compromises the tie-up entailed. 'Bullet Train Explosion' eventually delivers on the promise of its title, though not before multiple sequences that could have been taken straight from a promo video.
While the visual effects are top-notch, the carnage feels restrained compared to Higuchi's prior work, raising the suspicion that JR East only let him use the real-life Hayabusa on the condition that he not have too much fun destroying it.