Shinjuku Killers (1995)

Shinjuku Killers: Directed by Takashi Miike. With Kippei Shîna, Tomorô Taguchi, Takeshi Caesar, Ren Ôsugi. Amidst a Chinese and Japanese mafia war, a lawyer for the Chinese mob finds a rift forming between him and his corrupt police office brother.

“A lot has been said about Shinjuku Triad Society as the first true u0026quot;Miikeu0026quot; film and I thought this sort of description might have been a cliché. But, like all clichés, it is based on the truth. All the Miike trademarks are here, the violence, the black humour, the homosexuality, the taboo testing and the difficult to like central character. Shinjuku is however, one of Miikeu0026#39;s most perfectly formed films. He says in an interview that if he made it again it would be different, but not necessarily better. I think what he means is that the film possesses a truly captivating energy and raw edge which seems so fresh that although he might be able to capture a more visually or technically complex movie he could not replicate or better the purity of this film. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAs you might expect, the violence is utterly visceral, gushing blood and gritty beatings are supplemented by a fantastic scene in which a woman has a chair smashed over her face. (Only a Miike film could let you get away with a sentence like that.) The film has a fantastic pace, unlike Dead or Alive which begins and ends strongly and dips in the middle. Dead or Alive also deals with similar issues, Miike is clearly concerned about the relations between the Japanese and Chinese in the postwar period and this emotive subject is handled well here, the central character really coming to life when you begin to understand his past. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eI cannot sing Shinjukuu0026#39;s praises enough. I do not want to give away too much. This is Miike before he began to use CGI to animate his films and is almost reminiscent of something like Kitanou0026#39;s Sonatine. The central characters are superbly realized and the final twist guarantees that as soon as the film has finished youu0026#39;ll be popping it back on again to work it all out.”