meta: Thriller
2020
'The Adventures Of Denchu Kozo'/'Haze': Shorter Tsukamoto June 15, 2020
Two short films from Shinya Tsukamoto, now anthologized in the Arrow box set for the director, show off his cheeky-humored and bending-sinister sides
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'Deep Red': It Takes A Victim To Know A Killer May 25, 2020
The first of screenwriter Hisashi Nozawa's novels to find its way into English spellbinds, at least until its cop-out climax
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2019
'Cure': The Hollow(ed) Men April 26, 2019
Two decades on, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's mutant serial-killer thriller remains among his very best films, and one of Japan's finest from the 1990s generally
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2018
'Illang: The Wolf Brigade': Defanged November 19, 2018
Jee-woon Kim's live-action adaptation of Mamoru Oshii's 'Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade' is passable on its own, but doesn't come close to the primal shadow-play sorcery of the original
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Natsuo Kirino's 'Out': The Katori Corpse Disposal Service November 14, 2018
Natsuo Kirino's nervy thriller pits four working-class women against Japanese society -- not just its seedy underbelly, but its whole stacked deck of capital, class, and sex
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'Un-Go': The Truth Will Out September 3, 2018
These cyberpunk/SF mysteries drawn from the works of Ango Sakaguchi are intriguing for how they adapt a classic author, but grow far too gimmicky for their own good
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'The Man Who Stole The Sun': I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb. Now What? June 1, 2018
Almost forty years later, this jet-black comedy about a one-man nuclear terrorist ring remains an absurdist masterwork
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'Napping Princess': Slumberland Blues February 7, 2018
The one great idea to be found in Kenji Kamiyama's new film is stranded in a mishmash of a story that tries to do too many things and accomplishes almost none of them
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2017
'Funeral Parade Of Roses': Party Like It's 1969 November 24, 2017
More than forty years later, Toshio Matsumoto's psychedelic whirlpool of counterculture sexuality and continuity-shattering New Wave filmmaking remains a one-of-a-kind blast of cinematic fresh air
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Takeshi Kitano's 'Violent Cop': Contents Under Pressure October 11, 2017
'Beat' Takeshi Kitano's first outing as director remains among his best movies -- and also among his most nihilistic and unforgiving
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Victor Santos's 'Rashōmon': Edo Noir September 25, 2017
A clever and inventive retelling of three classic Japanese samurai-era tales, channeled through detective-noir sensibilities
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'Death Note' (2017): D.O.A. August 28, 2017
This isn't 'Death Note'; it's barely Cliffs Notes
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2016
'Ergo Proxy': I Think, Therefore You Are November 21, 2016
Few anime intended for mainstream consumption are this avowedly experimental; fewer still pull it off to the degree this one does
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2015
'Prophecy': Watching Big Brother Right Back August 18, 2015
On the face of it, a techno-thriller in the Michael Crichton vein; underneath that, a meditation on the way society is shamed into doing the right thing
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'Noir': Killing At Their Own Pace April 13, 2015
The deliberate pacing of this fantasy thriller is both its most important attribute -- and the one thing about it most likely to give pause to today's viewers
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'Utsubora': The Book Thief January 22, 2015
Somewhere between thriller, noir, mystery, erotica, and tragedy lies this absorbing, if convoluted, story of the thefts of both ideas and lives
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2014
'Paranoia Agent': We Have Met The Enemy And He Is Us October 3, 2014
The real monster in Satoshi Kon's genre-defying black comedy of horrors is human nature itself
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