Bullet Ballet

Another Japanese film choice last night , by writer/director/ actor Shinya "Tetsuo: The Iron Man". Like that classic , this is also shot in grainy black and white , employing frantic at times camerawork and some montage / animation briefly . It also has a Thirlwell/ Foetus style industrial soundtrack, and again deals with themes of alienation in a mega city.

Bullet Ballet, released in 1998,starts with Goda (played by the main man Shinya Tsukamoto) as a commercials director living in Tokyo who arrives home to find his wife has shot herself - either by accident or intent - with a .38 "chief's special" revolver. Goda suffers a breakdown of sorts and becomes obsessed with getting himself a similar piece. This leads him into contact with various underworld characters and into direct conflict with a gang of so-called street 'teamsters' - Japanese youths who work straight jobs but commit gang crimes at night. It is said that the idea for the film came from an actual street robbery experienced by Tsukamoto and the film mirrors his own very real feeling of complete helplessness as the gang take his money and deliver a beating without a whimper of resistance. This is just the start, and the viewer is introduced to a wide selection of criminal characters and becomes involved in a gang war triggered by the demand for an "honour" shooting to save face by gang boss Idei, played by the convincing Tatsuya Nakamura, who tells his minion to "get on with the shooting" and treat it like a dream... "In dreams you can kill and not get hurt ... Tokyo is one big dream" The gun as a motif throughout the film gives a strong focus on the finality of pulling the trigger rather than just spraying everybody in a blur of flashing muzzles and deep red, and there are several intense " will they or won't they " moments. Kirana Mano stands out as Chisato, a part time sex worker addicted to speed who comes across as a complex and deliberately contradictory person. However, it is the overall the style of the film : dingy back alleys, concrete industrial backdrops and claustrophobic camera shots emphasising the brutal relationships of the main players that is the real standout. This was often my experience of Tokyo at night when I lived there when out and about, in both places I went to and the type of characters encountered. To sum up, "Bullet Ballet" delivers an element of gritty realism to a believable storyline that makes sure not one round in the clip is wasted. Great punk-style movie-making.

After the amusing opening credits, playing with the title's two words, this takes an immediate dark and dangerous turn and doesn't stop till the end. The lovely Kirina Mano shines like some angelic figure amidst the grime, the violence and the mayhem. But even she has a very mean streak and it is clear that these are not the colourful, welcoming streets of Tokyo we love, these are the back alleys teeming with bored punk kids desperate to emulate or at least impress the raging yakuza. Shot in stark b/w, there is confusion as to quite what is going on at times but there is such a drive and confidence to the filming that there is no doubting that the director knows where the ride lead even if even some of the participants are unsure. Dirty, dynamic and disturbingly dark drama set in the underbelly of the backstreets of Shibuya(?) in the 1990s

Ever since I watched Bullet Ballet for the very first time it's been by far my favorite of all Tsukamoto films. Being a director with a cult following, Tsukamoto is one of the better known Japanese Directors of the last twenty years with a unique visual style of movement and imagery. After watching this film, Bullet Ballet could arguably be Tsukamoto's best film as some of his succeeding works have faltered to produce better quality of work ever since.

As the main character in Bullet Ballet, Tsukamoto himself plays a man named Goda who one night after his usual daily drinking routine goes home to find that his girlfriend of ten years has committed suicide by gun. Torn by his girlfriend's own demise, Goda goes out looking to buy a gun in the streets and along the way runs into a gang of punks who beat him up for a previous spat with the female gang member Chisako (played by the actress Kirina Mano), which leads Goda to hold a personal and unforgivable grudge towards Chisako that he will not let go without violence of his own.

The story and the cinematography of this film holds up this movie and while the acting may be questionable in some minor scenes it doesn't affect the film in any way. Like most of Tsukamoto's other films, Bullet Ballet is presented with plenty Tsukamoto's usual signature hand-held kinetic camera style in most of his films. In my opinion there's room to say that the story of this film could have benefited from some improvements here and there for the characters, though based on Japanese culture and behavior should they had made certain changes would have made the film a bit unusual for Japanese audiences to understand opposed to Western style filmmaking.

Compared to other Tsukamoto's films that I have enjoyed, this is definitely his best looking film to date. Tetsuo "The Iron Man"(1989) which blew me away still had a very dark look and even at times looked underexposed in some scenes. Still, I was amazed with what Tsukamoto was able to accomplish on Tetsuo with very little. A Snake of June is another one of his films that nicely paints a picture while being a very daring film to awe the viewer. In many ways A Snake of June would have given Bullet Ballet a run for its money to be Tsukamoto's best looking film had Tsukamoto have filmed A Snake of June in widescreen format instead of 4:3 full screen which I did not care for and annoyed the hell out of me.

Personally, I can't say I care for any of Tsukamoto's films shot in color except for maybe Vital which was beautifully shot. In spite of it, I still wonder whether I care for the story in Vital by itself, which I am still a bit conflicted about. Style over substance or not, Tsukamoto's visual style in itself is very unique, which can only be seen in films like these.

Whether it's old fashion or not, I still hope for Tsukamoto to one day go back to shooting films in black and white. I feel that in black in white movies he's able to present a much better looking product compared to the ones he made in color. As the current Japanese movie trend is shooting movies in Digital HD that look like video (which in my opinion ruins the visual aesthetics of a traditional film even though you save in budget by in shooting video) I hope Tsukamoto doesn't go on to follow just to save money and sacrifice production quality on his films. That would be a shame to say the least.

There are many versions of Bullet Ballet out there. The version I saw was the standard 87 minute version. There are longer versions in the mid 90 minute marks out there even one that goes on almost close to two hours, but are those rare to come by.

All in all, give Bullet Ballet a go and some of Tsukamoto's other works if you wish. You might enjoy some of them if you're into bizarre, weird and unusual stories. 8 out of 10.

This movie is rather underrated i feel.

This is the third movie i've seen by the director, the first being Snake of June and the second being Tetsuo: The Iron Man.

I'd say this film is better than those two films, although i very much like those two films i feel this one blows them out of the water in a lot of respects.

It's a much darker vision than Tetsuo, it's really full of dread this film. So that may put some off but it's a really interesting film and is amazingly directed and for the most part i feel it's really well acted.

For me this movie is like the two other Shinya Tsukamoto films i've seen mixed with Ichi The Killer sort of things. There are a lot of things in here that it seems Miike Takashi knowingly used in Ichi The Killer, of which Shinya Tsukamoto stars.

Yeah, a confusing and disjointed film and a film of two or maybe even three parts but a really interesting watch and the context and the interaction of the characters is excellent.

I'd say this film is very worth seeing indeed.

It's not that no one else does what Shinya Tsukamoto does, but that when he's at his best, nobody does it better. All the common staples of his style are here: loose, frenetic camerawork; sharp editing to produce rapid successions of imagery; industrial music. Add to this the black and white presentation of a very independent production, and the stage is set.

If Tsukamoto's boorishly over the top sequels to 'Tetsuo: The iron man' proved anything, it's that the filmmaker does his best work when he begins with the simplest idea and develops his story from there. In the case of 'Bullet ballet,' that means a man's obsession with obtaining a gun following his partner's suicide. From that premise comes a movie about a person living on the edge, and accidentally becoming involved in still more seedy matters in the process. By all means, it's a concept with great potential. I'm not convinced that the result here was entirely successful, but it's duly engaging, and compelling enough to mostly hold our attention.

Tsukamoto is a capable actor, and inhabits the lead role with strong range and nuance to realize the protagonist's anguished desperation. The writing of other characters is less discrete, but the rest of the cast are suitable nonetheless. I think each individual scene is composed and executed very well, with varying moods and temperaments across them all. I'm less enthused about the overall narrative, as it seems too disordered and busy for its own good. There are sound ideas here, both the central focus and the misadventures that the main character becomes involved in. But I feel like 'Bullet ballet' would be so much better if it were more concentrated on protagonist Goda and his flailing effort to acquire a weapon and end his own life. The more that the film spins out to weave in the thread of gang warfare, the thinner and weaker it becomes, especially since the two elements as they are written fail to converge with the cohesiveness they could have. The movie is full of solid possibility, but the rendition of the tale that we get just doesn't quite cut it.

With that said, I don't think this is bad. In fact, I'm inclined to say it starts out very strong, and even as the component parts fail to wholly integrate, I think the ending is pretty well done, too. The real issue is a floundering midsection that's a little all over the place, and just not tightly centered enough to totally work. More time spent developing the screenplay would have gone a long way. Still - while in part I wonder if I'm not being too kind as it is, more so than not I liked 'Bullet ballet.' It's far from perfect, but tells an engrossing story while refraining from the utmost bombast that bring down some of Tsukamoto's other pictures. This isn't necessarily a movie for someone who doesn't already appreciate the filmmaker's style, but for anyone open to it, it's a fair watch. Don't go out of your way, and keep the indelicacies firmly in mind, but if you happen to come across 'Bullet ballet,' it's not a bad way to spend 85 minutes.