The story goes that during the Edo era, when Japan was still hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world, criminals could be executed by a professional hit man at the request of a victim. Those who were sentenced to death in this way were informed in advance and were allowed to hire their own protection.
The hypothesis in the cult manga series Freesia by Matsumoto Jiro, and also in Kumakiri’s latest film Freesia – Bullet over Tears, is that in a repressive, chaotic Japan in the near future, this law will again apply. The protagonist is such an angel of revenge, Hiroshi. He showed his cold-bloodedness on his first commission for the Katsuma Revenge Agency and it will soon turn out to be erratic dispassion. Fifteen years earlier he was traumatised by an experiment with a ‘freeze bomb’ and stripped of human feelings. His female employer Higuchi was also hit by the same event and she wants to take revenge on Toshio, whose father was the soldier who ordered the gruesome experiment.
Kumakiri is one of the young Japanese directors who has affinity for both calm, psychological dramas and equally stylish and bloody genre films. Matsumoto’s dystopic vision of the future, which is primarily seen in the unexplained background chaos, is in very good hands with Kumakiri. Another manga considered unfilmable has been filmed. (GT)
Film details
- Country of production
- Japan
- Year
- 2007
- Festival edition
- IFFR 2007
- Length
- 103"
- Medium/Format
- 35mm
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