I don't know what that other guy's problem with Jun Fubuki is, she's over 50 now but still pretty cute. Unless you live in Japan, where she does a lot of TV, you probably don't know what she looks like now, anyway. Back when this film was made she was hot, as were all the other women in this film. Especially the black go-go chick! Anyway, this movie isn't about eyeballing the ladies, though that's no chore. It's about hating your life because you have some soulless job that your whole life is centered around, and it's about one guy who decides he will break out of that box -- no matter how rotten evil he has to be to make that happen! How Asakura got to be so good with weapons and street-wise with his wheeling and dealing isn't gone into much, we just know he's trained as a boxer. But that won't bother you because you'll just be wondering where he gets the nerve to be so bad! You might also wonder, as I did, whether he'll have a redeeming moment at the end...

Some may find the pace a little slow, but even when the story fails to develop in spots, Asakura keeps saying and doing nasty things. Favorite lines of dialog (early in the film, so not a spoiler): "Do you have a family?" "Yes! Yes! Please don't kill me!" "They'll be happier when you're dead." bang.

Enjoy!

Any film in which Sonny Chiba DOESN'T play the coolest character has got to be worth a look, if only to see who could possibly be more of a bad-ass than he. In The Resurrection of the Golden Wolf, that person is Yûsaku Matsuda, who plays Tetsuya Asakura, a seemingly meek accountant who takes the fast track to success and wealth rather than spending years climbing the corporate ladder; once his office work is over for the day, Asakura whips off his wig to reveal a trendy mop of permed hair, slips on his shades, and pursues a second career as a ruthless, gun-toting criminal who will stop at nothing to make his dreams come true.

This promising premise leads to plenty of exploitative nudity and violence, as Asakura stoops to sexually exploiting his boss's beautiful mistress Kyoko (the scrummy Jun Fubuki), consorts with a gang of drug dealers after a heist leaves him with 100 million yen of unusable notes, and becomes involved in a deadly game of corporate espionage, blackmail and murder. With it's many plot threads, played out over a massive 131 minutes, and so many thoroughly despicable characters to keep track of, this hard-boiled crime-noir isn't always easy to follow, but the good stuff—the gratuitous nookie, the violent shoot-outs, the macho posturing, the topless go-go dancers, the bleak ending—definitely make it worth persevering through any moments of confusion.

I could not prevent myself to think about the Bret Easton Ellis adapted novel - AMERICAN PSYCHO - whilst watching this pretty disturbing feature, in the pure line of what wrote the Japanese author, with his BEAST TO DIE, made one year later. Another nihilist blood thirsty and disturbing, nasty Jap movie, not for all audiences. I love this kind of stuff, but could definitely not watching this every day.