There are two main similarities between Tokyo
Fist (1995) and Bullet Ballet (1998) the first is
that director Shinya Tsukamoto takes the lead role and secondly the female lead
is another very strong character. This time she is a young women who joins a
gang of young street punks to serves her own needs.
Tokyo's Punk Street Gang. |
Filmed in atmospheric black and white and shot in Tokyo, TV
commercial film director Aida (Tsukamoto) comes home from the office to find
that his girlfriend has committed suicide shooting herself with an untraceable
firearm that she’s been asked to look after by a gangster friend. Its not
Aida’s day when later a gang of punks beats him up. As a result of these two
incidents he becomes obsessed with death and guns. Deciding to extract
vengeance he throws himself into a turf war with a ruthless gang of young
delinquents. His attempts to purchase a firearm go disastrously wrong when he
ends up paying 2.5 million yen for what turns out to be a water pistol filled
with sand. So he makes his own gun along with the bullets and sets out to shot
the punks in a nightclub, it’s there he first see’s the beautiful young punk
girl Chisato (Kirina Mano). Things get worse for Aida who gets involved with a
drug fuelled gang battle in the crowded Tokyo streets. But is he beginning to
fall in love with the young futuristically dressed punk goddess who seems to
have a death wish?
Nothing is ever explained and with minimal dialogue leaves
its audience to decide a meaning or are we back to looking at the link between city
and men concept? The director admitted
in an interview that the film was based on the directors feelings at becoming
38 years old, what’s he going to feel like when he turns 60 in 2020! At the time that the film was made there was
the emergence of ‘teamers’ in Japan, these are usually young men who live
normal respectable working lives during daytime but who act out violent
delinquency at night joining street gangs, the character of Goto is a good
example. It was this that was the trigger for Shinya to put pen to paper and camera
to eye and make a film based around their exploits. He wanted to depict a
battle between young teamers and an older generation. The director also admits
being influenced by Scorsese’s Taxi
Driver (1976) and the American film director Larry Clark.
Great atmospheric shots of the city from Shinya and like Snake in June (2002) make great use of
rain drenched desolate urban landscapes of a non neon lit Tokyo. Heavy violence
carrying a certain menace compounded by the demanding metal soundtrack and
Shinya’s brilliant direction again dares the voyeur in us all to take our eyes
from the screen. A movie that involves guns, violence and destruction all
brilliantly intercut with scenes of men at war. Both this movie and Tokyo Fist have a new digital
restoration released on Blu- ray, so now’s the best time to sample these
examples of Japanese cinema at its best.
Revenge Taxi Driver style. |
No comments:
Post a Comment