BIRDS is the second part of Takashi Miike's DEAD OR ALIVE trilogy and a superior film to the first. This one sees the main two actors from the original returning in new roles, playing a pair of assassins who meet and realise that they were childhood friends. They give up their violent ways and instead head off to a bucolic island where they spent glorious summers as children, but the violent past is due to catch up with them. This time around the main characters are actually likeable to a degree, and Miike's direction feels more confident and assured. There are still the sexual and bad taste situations, but they're integrated into the story better. The highlight of the film is a great set-piece sequence which juxtaposes a school-set pantomime with the usual bloody Yakuza shoot-outs and slayings. The more offbeat elements of the story work well too and the ending is cleverly written.

Two contract killers cross paths on the same job and realize they are childhood friends. Together they take a break from killing and visit the small island they once called home. After reflecting on their past lives they decide to team up and use their talents in killing for good... upsetting the crime syndicates they used to work for.

This film is far sillier than the first, with special effects that make this have almost science fiction qualities (which were absent from part one other than the final shot and maybe a few minutes leading up to that). Is it supposed to be a fantasy of sorts? With Miike, you never really know.

Perhaps the most bizarre "fantasy" element in the entire film is the inclusion of footage of starving African children. Apparently this is to symbolize that by taking on the bad guys, those in need will now be saved. This is, of course, pretty much nonsense if you think killing a mob boss somehow helps starving children in Africa. And using actual footage rather than actors seems a bit insensitive. But again, Miike does not really concern himself with making sure his audience is not offended.

"Dead or Alive 2" is a sequel in name only, with its only obvious connection to the first film being the return of the lead actors. Because they are playing different roles, it does not seem to make sense to give this film the same title. But Tom Mes does find there to be a thematic connection. As he notes, "The ethnic rootlessness... is replaced here by the genealogical rootlessness of the orphaned child." True enough, though with rootlessness being a common Miike theme, this does not make the "Dead or Alive" series unique in that way.

Although Arrow Video had Tom Mes record commentary for all three "Black Society" films and the first "Dead or Alive", he mysteriously does not provide commentary on parts two and three of "Dead or Alive". In fact, the special features seem to be primarily focused on the first film, which is a bit of a shame (even if we can all agree it is the most iconic of the series).

Takashi Miike's Dead or Alive 2: Birds is loaded with allegory and symbolism, some that works (like having feathers continually popping up from time to time in the midst of murders, or the sometimes mentioned comet representing wonder in the unknown) and some that doesn't (the re-appearances of the wings on the backs of Mizuki and Shu, and the over-usage of archive clips of impoverished people in Africa to emphasize the two hit men's end goal to donate all their money to that). But at the core Miike has a very thematically rich film, where the insanity, shame and/or brutality of bloodshed and violence and death are contrasted with what comes before people go down the path of crime- childhood.

It's maybe that one is given sight to bloody scenes in person as a child, as Mizuki does when he sees his step-father dying on the bathroom floor dialing on the phone (one of the great images in the film). Or it's just that there doesn't seem to be much of a choice, or out of convenience, it's hard to say. Miike isn't out for easy answers anyway, but after a sort of bizarre meditation on the loss of the innocence we all have in youth, and how it can become uglier and without meaning. It's also, on top of this, a very good story of friendship and ties that bind that friendship going beyond professional duty or consequence.

Mizuki and Shu, played by Riki Takeuchi and Sho Aikawa, also from the first DOA (however not connected by character or plot, only in part by mood),are hit men for a hire, and Mizuki, who hasn't seen Shu in many years, witnesses him kill a bunch of gangsters that he was supposed to fire on with a sniper. He follows him, and it leads the both of them, as they're in hiding for suspected/actual murders and money stolen, to the island of their youth. We see flashbacks of said childhood, of fun playing on the beach (a sweet gag, uncommon for Miike, is when one of the kids is buried in the sand and the other kids run away),but also the pain of separating and finding violence among them, like with Mizuki. Nostalgia comes back tenfold, as they reunite with another old friend, and Miike actually crafts sentimental scenes in this middle chunk that work, somehow, because they don't feel very cheap. Then, as if trying to cleanse themselves of their old crime-syndicate ways, they work at a playground helping out kids, and they even put on a demented play involving goofy innuendo with Cinderella and various animals.

This play scene is juxtaposed with the sprawling yakuza/triad warfare that breaks out back at home, and it's here that Miike has not only, for my money, the best sequence of the film, but one of his best sequences to date. The play Mizuzki, Shu and the others put on is immature and a little crude, but shown to be all the more innocent and playful when compared to the manic, multiple murders that occur between the two gangs, as bullets fly, blood flows, and bodies contort all over the place as neither side really comes out victorious, or with many members left. It's Miike leashing out his wicked, no-holds-barred style, but also the goodness on the other side of the coin, and it doesn't get much better for a fan like myself. On the other hand, Dead or Alive 2, following this sequence, gets weirder by the minute, and sometimes not always for the best. With the focused narrative flow given for the Mizuki/Shu story, where they decide to come back to the mainland and keep going with their killings for money in un-selfish reasons, there's another subplot involving, I'd guess, the other killers out to kill them. But it comes off muddled, and even with Miike going for enjoyably crazy images like a midget walking on stilts, or the fate of a character named Jiro, it suddenly felt as if Miike was getting off track of what was working best.

But if anything, DOA 2 tops the first one by delivering the goods on substance just as well as the style. Miike is always out for experimentation, with his editing and transitions and usage of a symbolic inter-title "Where are you Going". And isn't above getting some touching last scenes with Mizuki and Shu on the boat (Takeuchi, by the way, is one of Miike's best actors),even if it feels very sudden, that could be forced by another director but through him feel compassionate to their doom. While Miike and his screenwriter don't quite get deep enough to make this a great film about lifelong criminal friends, and he's still into getting laughs out of depraved acts of violence and bizarre sex (i.e. that giant penis in a couple of scenes),it's surely one of the better yakuza movies I've yet to see to go past its limitations and make it a movie where the main characters aren't just cardboard cut-outs meant for shouting dialog and dying at a clip.