Immortal Hero: Review

27th March 2020

“Immortal Hero” is a Japanese film based on Ryuho Okawa, the founder of Happy Science, a religious movement that evidently claims to have over 11 million followers worldwide. Okawa, unsurprisingly, executive produced this film and his daughter, Sayaka, wrote the screenplay.

Immortal Hero follows Makoto Mioya, aka the movie version of Okawa, a best selling self-help author and founder of a publishing company. When we meet Makoto in the beginning of the film we see him struggling to breathe and dramatically clutching his chest.

He’s having a Japanese soap opera version of a heart attack, and is subsequently rushed to a hospital where he is told he will not live to see another day. What will he do? How will he survive? Well, lucky for Makoto, he can see dead people. One I think was Jesus, the other maybe Buddha, I’m not sure about the rest of his visions, the visual effects looked like they were made on an IBM computer circa 1987.

Anyway, the random spirits tell him that he is in fact the chosen one, he will unite all of the people of the world and all of the religions of the world in one fell swoop. He will save humanity when he thinks himself well, and he does just that!

He thinks himself well! In true messiah like fashion, he repairs his own heart with his mind, all those spirits were right! Alas, the mission is not complete, Makoto will now attempt to inspire the world as the chosen and lead them into the light.

I know to some of you reading this may think, is she joking? No. This is actually the plot of this film; though I am being cheeky. The direction is poor, the music, oh, the music. Probably some of the weirdest, most vain, cheesy songs I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Let’s see, what else? We’ve discussed the visual effects; oh! The acting. I don’t know if it qualifies as acting?

Over the top, laughable in places. Even the pop in characters seemed confused. I count my favorite as a former business associate of Makoto, a Londoner named Robert, who was so inspired by Makoto that he travelled all the way from London to Tokyo to let him know live and in person that he was able to heal his cancer with his mind after he read his book!

In a scene with bar none the worst editing I have ever seen Robert goes from jovial to sad and crying when there is a cut from wide angle to close up, I guess they forgot that wide angle of him crying. Ah, those pesky minor details.

I really don’t know what else to say about this. I legitimately am at a loss for words, and I have nothing positive to say. I can sum up my feelings about this film with a famous quote from “Billy Madison,” (1995) “I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.”

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