"Beating up a good guy is violence, but beating up a bad guy is justice." Well Go has revealed a new official trailer for the Japanese action thriller film titled Bad City, from filmmaker Kensuke Sonomura. This looks Damn good!! It initially premiered at the 2022 Neuchâtel Fantastic Film Festival in Switzerland, and it also played at Fantastic Fest last year, arriving in the US this August to watch. Kaiko City is plagued with poverty and crime. When a corrupt businessman decides to run for mayor and starts eliminating opponents from the rival mafia, a former police captain serving time for murder is secretly released and put in charge of a task force to find & arrest him. Starring Hitoshi Ozawa, Akane Sakanoue, Katsuya, Masanori Mimoto, Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, Yasukaze Motomiya, Tak Sakaguchi, Kazuki Namioka, Lily Franky, and Mitsu Dan. Bad City is an homage to V-Cinema. Reviews are god, saying "Ozawa just...
- 7/24/2023
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Stars: Lily Franky, Tak Sakaguchi, Rino Katase, Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, Mitsu Dan, Masaya Katō, Hitoshi Ozawa, Hideto Katsuya, Masanori Mimoto, Akane Sakanoue | Directed by Kensuke Sonomura
Wataru Gojō CEO of the Gojo Conglomerate is the most powerful man in Kaiko City, the Bad City of the title. He’s just been acquitted of corruption charges and declared his candidacy for mayor in order to go after those he says are really behind the corruption.
As he’s holding a press conference an assassin is hacking their way through members of the Sakurada Yakuza clan. Suspicion falls on the Korean mafia and their enigmatic leader Madam. It may not be a coincidence that their chief enforcer Kim Seung-gi, and Gojō are acquainted.
As open warfare breaks out on the city’s streets the head of public safety Koizumi and Chief Prosecutor Hirayama form an unofficial task force to take Gojō. Unfortunately, the...
Wataru Gojō CEO of the Gojo Conglomerate is the most powerful man in Kaiko City, the Bad City of the title. He’s just been acquitted of corruption charges and declared his candidacy for mayor in order to go after those he says are really behind the corruption.
As he’s holding a press conference an assassin is hacking their way through members of the Sakurada Yakuza clan. Suspicion falls on the Korean mafia and their enigmatic leader Madam. It may not be a coincidence that their chief enforcer Kim Seung-gi, and Gojō are acquainted.
As open warfare breaks out on the city’s streets the head of public safety Koizumi and Chief Prosecutor Hirayama form an unofficial task force to take Gojō. Unfortunately, the...
- 10/5/2022
- by Jim Morazzini
- Nerdly
Click here to read the full article.
Well Go USA has acquired all North American rights to Japanese director Kensuke Sonomura’s heavy-hitting crime thriller Bad City.
A follow-up to the genre director’s assassin thriller Hydra from last year, Bad City will screen at Austin’s Fantastic Fest on Friday, followed by an in-competition slot at Sitges in October.
Well Go will first release the film over its martial arts specialty streamer Hi-yah! as a Hi-yah! Original, followed by a theatrical outing and broader VOD release sometime later this year.
The film is set in Kaiko City, a place torn apart by rampant corruption and violence amongst a private conglomerate, the yakuza and even the authorities. But after a mafia-connected businessman runs for mayor and begins systematically eliminating his opponents, a former police captain imprisoned for murder is released in a desperate, last-ditch effort to take the corrupt tycoon down.
Well Go USA has acquired all North American rights to Japanese director Kensuke Sonomura’s heavy-hitting crime thriller Bad City.
A follow-up to the genre director’s assassin thriller Hydra from last year, Bad City will screen at Austin’s Fantastic Fest on Friday, followed by an in-competition slot at Sitges in October.
Well Go will first release the film over its martial arts specialty streamer Hi-yah! as a Hi-yah! Original, followed by a theatrical outing and broader VOD release sometime later this year.
The film is set in Kaiko City, a place torn apart by rampant corruption and violence amongst a private conglomerate, the yakuza and even the authorities. But after a mafia-connected businessman runs for mayor and begins systematically eliminating his opponents, a former police captain imprisoned for murder is released in a desperate, last-ditch effort to take the corrupt tycoon down.
- 9/23/2022
- by Patrick Brzeski
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Yoshihiro Nishimura throws every ingredient into this overblown, overcooked and oddly endearing underworld romp
Cult Japanese filmmaker Yoshihiro Nishimura, who started off doing special effects before moving into the director’s chair, is best known for pulpy, action-horror fare with self-explanatory titles such as Mutant Girls Squad and Tokyo Gore Police, as well as the more enigmatically monikered Meatball Machine Kodoku.
Tokyo Dragon Chef, I’m assuming, lies tonally between the one about gore police and the one about meatball machines given it’s about a pair of ageing yakuza thugs, Ryu (Yasukaze Motomiya) and Tatsu (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), who decide to open a ramen restaurant. Their speciality, which does indeed look darn tasty, is a recipe Tatsu honed while doing time and working in the prison’s mess hall, a kind of ma po tofu with ramen.
Cult Japanese filmmaker Yoshihiro Nishimura, who started off doing special effects before moving into the director’s chair, is best known for pulpy, action-horror fare with self-explanatory titles such as Mutant Girls Squad and Tokyo Gore Police, as well as the more enigmatically monikered Meatball Machine Kodoku.
Tokyo Dragon Chef, I’m assuming, lies tonally between the one about gore police and the one about meatball machines given it’s about a pair of ageing yakuza thugs, Ryu (Yasukaze Motomiya) and Tatsu (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), who decide to open a ramen restaurant. Their speciality, which does indeed look darn tasty, is a recipe Tatsu honed while doing time and working in the prison’s mess hall, a kind of ma po tofu with ramen.
- 1/21/2021
- by Leslie Felperin
- The Guardian - Film News
Yoshihiro Nishimura continues to bring his absurdly grotesque imagination on the big screen with “Tokyo Dragon Chef”, although this time, in a fashion much tamer than “Helldriver” or “Kodoku Meatball Machine” but equally fun and nonsensical.
Ex yakuza members Ryu and Tatsu reconnect after the latter is released from prison, following the dismemberment of their and a number of other gangs by a group wearing masks of eye bulbs, led by a mysterious young man named Gizumo. Ryo convinces Tatsu to open up a ramen restaurant and the two embark in their paths as host and cook respectively. Their shop quickly becomes a success, after a young girl helps them with marketing, in the most illogical way. However, Jin and Kazu, two brothers who also happen to be their rivals from yakuza days, open a ramen canteen nearby and after hiring a rather unusual girl influencer to promote their shop,...
Ex yakuza members Ryu and Tatsu reconnect after the latter is released from prison, following the dismemberment of their and a number of other gangs by a group wearing masks of eye bulbs, led by a mysterious young man named Gizumo. Ryo convinces Tatsu to open up a ramen restaurant and the two embark in their paths as host and cook respectively. Their shop quickly becomes a success, after a young girl helps them with marketing, in the most illogical way. However, Jin and Kazu, two brothers who also happen to be their rivals from yakuza days, open a ramen canteen nearby and after hiring a rather unusual girl influencer to promote their shop,...
- 12/17/2020
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
To what extent is “Deadly Outlaw: Rekka” (aka Violent Fire) simply just another Takashi Miike yakuza flick, drenched in the overly common tropes of betrayal, inter-family politics, and vengeance? On one hand, this semi-maniacal reimagining of Shigenori Takechi’s script (previously adapted in 2001 as the gloriously epic “Agitator“) is an exercise in weirdness and in collaboration; a world occupied with familiar faces in the Miike canon, hanging out and enjoying making almost no sense whatsoever. On the other hand, it is a long overdue and extended music video to one of the most celebrated Japanese psych rock albums to ever grace a record player – Flower Travellin’ Band’s 1971 masterpiece Satori. What you have then is more than just some film: “Rekka” signifies the countercultural wheel yanking its tail and swallowing it whole, bound to an endless cycle of repetition and recurrences; for the most part it is an almighty blast to experience.
- 1/21/2020
- by Jamie Cansdale
- AsianMoviePulse
At the moment, the Yakuza film does not hold the place it used to in the Japanese cinema industry. However, occasionally some films in the genre do appear, with Kitano’s “Outrage” trilogy and Shiraishi’s “Blood of Wolves” being the most renowned of the latest years. It was a surprise to me though, to discover that an almost unknown 2016 film by Kenichi Fujiwara, was the best Yakuza film I have seen in years, to the point that I got really frustrated I had not heard anything about it before. It is also worth mentioning that the 163-minute film was produced to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the direct-to-video production company All In Entertainment.
Conflict is screening at Japan Film Fest Hamburg
Due to the anti-Yakuza Laws, the traditional organized crime is experiencing bad times, and the Tendo clan seems to be in a lot of trouble. One of the central members,...
Conflict is screening at Japan Film Fest Hamburg
Due to the anti-Yakuza Laws, the traditional organized crime is experiencing bad times, and the Tendo clan seems to be in a lot of trouble. One of the central members,...
- 5/25/2019
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
Reviewed as part of the 27th Leeds International Film Festival (6-21 Nov, 2013)
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Dir: Takanori Tsujimoto, 2013
Weary samurai Toramaru (Mitsuki Koga) has returned from his year-long pilgrimage, having travelled across Japan and fought against seven formidable foes. Now, kneeling before his sensei Gensai (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), he relates the challenges through flashback, with each of his enemies representing a different martial art and, crucially, a telltale dish. Toramaru begins every account with a description of his preparatory meal, with Gensai excitedly trying to piece together the clues like a culinary Clouseau. Welcome to the Cosmic Way, where honour and enlightenment can be achieved through one sacred tenet: know your opponent through what he eats.
It may be a gimmick, but then the martial arts/cuisine comedy crossover is hardly a crowded field. Although the film’s low budget is plain to see, such financial restraints have doubtless forced...
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Dir: Takanori Tsujimoto, 2013
Weary samurai Toramaru (Mitsuki Koga) has returned from his year-long pilgrimage, having travelled across Japan and fought against seven formidable foes. Now, kneeling before his sensei Gensai (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), he relates the challenges through flashback, with each of his enemies representing a different martial art and, crucially, a telltale dish. Toramaru begins every account with a description of his preparatory meal, with Gensai excitedly trying to piece together the clues like a culinary Clouseau. Welcome to the Cosmic Way, where honour and enlightenment can be achieved through one sacred tenet: know your opponent through what he eats.
It may be a gimmick, but then the martial arts/cuisine comedy crossover is hardly a crowded field. Although the film’s low budget is plain to see, such financial restraints have doubtless forced...
- 11/12/2013
- by Dan Wakefield
- Obsessed with Film
Bushido Man
Written by Takanori Tsujimoto
Directed by Takanori Tsujimoto
Japan, 2013
Ingenuity can go a long way in filmmaking. It is one thing to have a large budget and get creative, it is an altogether different matter to be forced into creative thinking and film techniques because a team of creative minds have no serious budget to speak of. Perhaps it is in those instances that the fruit born out of the efforts of filmmakers shines brightest. When one has no money to spend freely, one must think a bit outside the box after all. Enter Bushido Man, which had its North Ameican premier at the 2013 Fantasia Film Festival, a movie displaying a feverish amount of exuberance.
It is after a long and arduous journey of personal discovery that Toramaru (Mitsuki Koga) returns to the Cosmic Way school of martial arts. His master (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi) is especially pleased to see...
Written by Takanori Tsujimoto
Directed by Takanori Tsujimoto
Japan, 2013
Ingenuity can go a long way in filmmaking. It is one thing to have a large budget and get creative, it is an altogether different matter to be forced into creative thinking and film techniques because a team of creative minds have no serious budget to speak of. Perhaps it is in those instances that the fruit born out of the efforts of filmmakers shines brightest. When one has no money to spend freely, one must think a bit outside the box after all. Enter Bushido Man, which had its North Ameican premier at the 2013 Fantasia Film Festival, a movie displaying a feverish amount of exuberance.
It is after a long and arduous journey of personal discovery that Toramaru (Mitsuki Koga) returns to the Cosmic Way school of martial arts. His master (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi) is especially pleased to see...
- 7/30/2013
- by Edgar Chaput
- SoundOnSight
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