Black Rat is a 2010 Japanese Slasher Film directed by Kenta Fukasaku. It stars Misaki Yonemura, Hiroya Matsumoto, and Rina Saito.
High school student Asuka kills herself by jumping from the rooftop of her school wearing a rat mask. Forty-nine days later, six of Asuka's classmates—Misato, Kengo, Takashi, Ryota, Ryota's girlfriend Saki, and Kanako—receive an e-mail supposedly from Asuka asking them to meet in Classroom 3B at midnight. The six students gather in the classroom and, at midnight, a figure wearing a schoolgirl uniform and a rat mask arrives. The masked figure writes the names of the six students on the blackboard. Remaining silent, the figure communicates through messages written in her notebook. She shows a page saying "Let's start the vengeance", and crosses Kengo's name off the board. She brings a blood-covered Kengo into the room and announces that she will kill them all.
Tropes:
- Ain't Too Proud to Beg: Takashi ends his life on his knees begging the Black Rat for mercy.
- All Girls Want Bad Boys: Nice Girl Asuka is in love with resident bad boy Ryota. Him dumping her for Saki is a major factor in her being Driven to Suicide.
- And This Is for...: Ryota bludgeons Kengo to death while screaming Takashi and Kanako's names in vengeance.
- Antagonist Title: Black Rat refers to the killer dressed in the schoolgirl uniform and rat mask.
- Batter Up!: Initially the Black Rat uses a baseball bat as her primary weapon, killing Takashi with it.
- The Benchwarmer: As one of her 'elimination games', the Black Rat tells Takashi that, as he is a member of the school soccer team, if he can block her shot on goal then she will let him go. Takashi protests that he is a 'phantom player' and has never actually been on the pitch.
- Building of Adventure: All of the action, and most of the flashbacks, take place inside the high school.
- Camera Abuse: When the Black Rat smashes in Takashi's head with a baseball bat, blood splatters over the camera.
- Cell Phones Are Useless: When the Black Rat initially confronts the six teenagers in the school at midnight, she infects their phones with virus: disabling them so they cannot call for help.
- Creepy Crossdresser: It turns out that there are actually two Black Rats: Asuka's sister Akane, and Kengo, who wears the same schoolgirl uniform and rat mask.
- Crowbar Combatant: Ryoka gives Saki a crowbar to defend herself with. After mistaking Ryoka for the Rat, she severely injures him with it. Later, she manages to fight the Rat to a standstill with it—despite the Rat having an axe—and comes close to killing her with it.
- Deadly Game: The Black Rat apparently prepared 'elimination games' for each of the six students, promising to let them live if they succeed in the challenge. Takashi has to block her shot on goal, and Kanako has to score 100 on a karaoke game. They both fail, and it is never revealed what the other four tests would have been.
- Deus Ax Machina: Misato comes after Saki with a fire axe. As she did not have it with her when she arrived, she must have acquired it inside the school.
- Dressing to Die: Asuka puts on her handmade rat mask before she jumps from the school roof.
- Driven to Suicide: Asuka suggested to her six classmates that they perform a modern version of a traditional rat-themed dance for their school's cultural festival. Though Misato is supportive, the others are reluctant and are repelled by a rat mask Asuka had crafted for the performance. This, combined with Saki stealing her boyfriend Ryota, drives Asuka to throw herself off the school roof while wearing the rat mask.
- Due to the Dead: Misato makes a shrine to Asuka on the roof where she jumped to her death. From the amount of flowers around it, it seems she is not the only person in the school who visits it.
- Exploding Fish Tanks: When the Black Rat initially attacks the students in Classroom 3B, a missed swing of her baseball bat shatters the class aquarium. This is followed by several close-ups of the goldfish dying on the floor.
- External Combustion: Finally managing to escape from the school, Ryoka attempts to escape on his motor scooter, but the vehicle explodes, killing him.
- Faking the Dead: Akane pretends to kill Kengo at the start of the massacre, allowing him to disappear and don the same costume as Akane to become a second Black Rat.
- High-Voltage Death: The Black Rat kills Kanako is a jury-rigged electric chair.
- Hoist by Her Own Petard: Akane falls down the stairs and impales herself on the machete she was trying to kill Misato with.
- Improvised Weapon: Ryoka builds a makeshift polearm out of items he finds in the janitor's closet, and Misato does an excellent job of defending herself against the Rat's machete using only a fire bucket.
- Japanese Delinquents: Ryota is one, having red-dyed hair styled in a pompadour and pierced ears, wearing his white school shirt open over a black t-shirt, smoking constantly (even in school), and riding a motor scooter. He is also shown to know his way around weaponry and builds a makeshift naginata to fight the Rat.
- Late to the Tragedy: Misato arrives late to the midnight meeting at the high school and finds the classroom smashed up and blood on the floor, but has no idea what happened.
- Lodged-Blade Recycling: Attempted. After falling down the stairs and impaling herself on her machete, Akane pulls the blade out and starts advancing on Misato again, only to expire from blood loss.
- Machete Mayhem: The Black Rat uses a machete when she attempts to kill Misato on the roof of the school.
- Malevolent Masked Men: Six high school students receive mysterious messages asking them to meet in a classroom at midnight, after which they are targeted by a silent figure wearing a schoolgirl uniform and a rat mask.
- Necktie Headband: When the Black Rat offers to let Takashi go if he can block his shot on goal, Takashi takes off his necktie and ties it around his head to show how serious he is. It doesn't help.
- Once More, with Clarity: At the midpoint, the film revisits the opening with the bloodied Kengo. It turns out that the masked man is Ryota, attacking him in revenge for killing his classmates.
- Pipe Pain: Ryota constructs a makeshift naginata out of a length of pipe and tools he finds in the janitor's closet. During his fight against the Black Rat, the Rat cuts his weapon in half. Ryoga uses half of the pipe without the blade to keep fighting. He is much more successful with just the pipe and ends up using it to kill Kengo.
- Plot-Triggering Death: The film literally starts with Asuka's suicide, and that is the event that drives the entire plot.
- Pursued Protagonist: The film opens with a bloodied Kengo clad only in his underpants being hunted through the school corridors by a figure in a rat mask.
- Rescue Equipment Attack: When the Black Rat attacks Misato on the roof of the school with a machete, Misato grabs a fire bucket and uses it to defend herself. Initially, she tosses the water into the Rat's face, then uses the bucket to parry the machete blows, and finally uses the bucket to trip the Rat.
- School Uniforms are the New Black: All six students come to the meeting at the school at midnight in school uniform, despite it being after hours, unofficial and possibly illegal.
- Self-Offense: Saki sees a figure wearing the rat mask strangling Kengo and attacks it with her crowbar, not realising that it is her boyfriend Ryota who had put the mask on after taking it off Kengo.
- Sinister Scraping Sound: When Kengo is trying to escape from Ryota, his pursuer is holding a length of steel pipe that drags on the floor; making a sinister scraping sound as they inexorably advance on him.
- Staircase Tumble: Akane trips over Misato's fire bucket and falls down stairs; ending up impaling herself on her machete.
- Static Stun Gun: The killer uses an electric stun gun to knock out Kanako. When she wakes up, she is wired to a chair in the AV lab.
- Stepford Smiler: Asuka always smiled regardless of the circumstances, to the point that Kanako called it creepy, and Ryota and Saki both tell her to stop. Shortly before her suicide, she confesses to Kengo that she is not always smiling because she is happy.
- Talking with Signs: The Black Rat communicates to her targets only through text written on notebook pages.
- Trip Trap: When the nearly naked Kengo is fleeing from the figure in the rat mask, he trips over a tripwire and falls onto the floor which is covered in broken glass from the shattered fluorescent tubes.
- Two Dun It: It turns out there are actually two different killers wearing the rat mask: Asuka's sister Akane, and Creepy Crossdresser Kengo. At the end of the film, after Akane and Kengo have both been killed, Misato dons the mask to kill the last survivor Saki.
