Monday, April 4, 2016

THE WORLD OF KANAKO (2014)

Whew! This film was exhausting.  It wasn't the story (although it was depressing) that wore me out, but the fast editing and the non-stop tight shots.  I honestly don't think there was a single shot in the entire film that was over 15 seconds long.  I only counted one that was 12 seconds.  On the bright side though, the music and the acting are great.

Former detective Koji Yakusho's daughter has disappeared.  His ex-wife doesn't even tell him until after she's been missing for a few days!  He barely even knows his daughter, but nothing will stop him from finding her.  Even if it means he has to rape two women, sexually assault an underage girl, get shot once, vomit a few times, kidnap a woman, step on glass, shoot a guys hand off, get stabbed with a screwdriver, purposely wreck his car twice, kidnap a young boy and attack nearly every person he comes in contact with.  And was it all worth it?  Not really, because in the end he finds out that this daughter is pretty much the human incarnation of the demon Pazuzu from the "The Exorcist" novel.  This chick is pure evil.

Despite the frantic editing, I still enjoyed THE WORLD OF KANAKO.  At first it was pissing me off, but eventually I began to get used to it and got lost in the story.  Good performances by Koji Yakusho and Nana Komatsu, dark as fook story, runtime that was 20 minutes too long, great music (I especially liked "LSD" by Trippple Nippples and "Free Fall" by Yoko Kanno), male-on-female rape, male-on-male rape, some guy stepping on another guys exposed intestines, crooked cops, torture, sexual predators.  THE WORLD OF KANAKO isn't a feel good film by any stretch of the imagination, but if you enjoy dark crime dramas then you'll probably like it.  Just be ready for the editing.