"Adults cannot be trusted": The brutal 1999 Japanese movie that influenced "Squid Game"

Netflix's global phenomenon Squid Game owes a debt to a Japanese movie made a quarter-century earlier, as revealed by Cezary Jan Strusiewicz for Tokyo Weekender.

Squid Game's creator Hwang Dong-hyuk openly acknowledges drawing inspiration from Battle Royale, the cult 1999 story about middle school students forced to fight to the death by a fascist government.

Strusiewicz traces Battle Royale's own haunting origins: from its creator's nightmare about a beloved TV teacher turning murderous, to director Kinji Fukasaku's traumatic World War II experiences that shaped the film's anti-authoritarian message.

"When I read the original story, I felt I had to make a serious movie about people dying as it reminded me of my own experiences in ninth grade," Fukasaku revealed in the book, Battle Royale Insider, referring to his horrific wartime duty of collecting severed limbs after an air raid on his school's munitions factory. "As I lifted severed arms and legs, I had a fundamental awakening… Adults could not be trusted."

While the original Battle Royale novel focused primarily on action, Strusiewicz argues that Fukasaku transformed it into something deeper – a searing commentary on how systems exploit the vulnerable. This same DNA runs through Squid Game, where desperate contestants compete in deadly children's games for prize money. As Fukasaku reflected in his final days, "Without my experiences during the war, Battle Royale would have been just another action movie. Instead, it became a warning about what happens when society betrays its children."