Beach Volleyball Detectives (3½ Stars)

"There are two styles in Beach Volleyball. One is White Beach Volleyball. It's for justice. The other is Black Sand Beach. It's the dark side".

That quote should suffice to show that this isn't a film to be taken seriously. The premise of the film is that beach volleyball is an ancient fighting art which has been disguised as a sport. If you can accept that you can enjoy the film. If not, there's no point in watching it.

Haruka, Mie and Kie are three police officers in a small Japanese town. Beach volleyball is their life, whether they're at work or play. In their spare time they're on the beach playing volleyball. When they're on duty they capture criminals by throwing volleyballs at them.

One day they're called into the station and told that there's an important mission. A terrorist intends to detonate a nuclear bomb in Japan. Nobody knows who he is, but there are leads that the bomb is hidden at the international beach volleyball championship in Tokyo. Wakana, a detective from Hawaii has been assigned to lead the squad on an undercover mission. The four women enter the competition as the Japanese team.

Unfortunately the film's budget didn't stretch to hiring foreign actors. The Russian team is played by Japanese women with blonde wigs. The Indian team is played by Japanese women with dark makeup. The Chinese team is played by Japanese women with big breasts.

While investigating the plot at the beach volleyball championship the girls discover something even bigger and more evil. What can be more evil than detonating a nuclear bomb? Only one thing. There's a network of illegal beach volleyball championships in which girls have to fight to the death. This is a perversion of the noble fighting art of beach volleyball. What's more important? Saving millions of Japanese lives or protecting the integrity of beach volleyball? That's an easy question to answer. People come and go, but beach volleyball lasts forever.

For some unfathomable reason this film has an 18 certificate. Why? There's no nudity in the film. The violence is limited to throwing volleyballs. Even when the girls take a bath after their games the camera shows nothing more than heads and shoulders. You can see nothing that you don't see in the live coverage of the Olympic games.