Director: Seijun Suzuki
Runtime: 89 min
Country: Japan
Language: Japanese with English Subtitles
Rating: PG
Synopsis
A brutal turf war erupts in the underworld as gangs vie for control over the illegal trade of stolen American arms. With the cops unable to contain the bloodbath, private detective Hideo Tajima steps in. Infiltrating a secretive yakuza faction, Tajima gets more than what he bargained for when he shows interest in the mob leader’s mistress.
Swinging wildly between slick shootouts and farcical comic stylings, and set to an ecstatic jazz score, Detective Bureau 2-3 features one of several significant collaborations between lead actor Jo Shishido and director Seijun Suzuki. Unhappy with being typecast as the handsome romantic hero from the early days of his career, Shishido enlarged his cheeks surgically, and took on the more hard-boiled roles that came to define him in later years. The menacingly unhinged, yet charming and absurd aura that Shishido came to possess after this physical transformation made him the perfect leading man for Suzuki’s offbeat crime films.
For the full Retrospective: Seijun Suzuki programme, please click here.
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