Bad City (Japan, 2022)

Nathan's Take:

After being acquitted on corruption charges, businessman Gojo (Lily Franky), announces his intention to become mayor of Kaiko City. With Korean Crime Boss, Seung-gi (Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi), in his pocket and a number of connections to politicians and prosecutors, Gojo's rise to the position looks to be all but certain until a special investigation team lead by disgraced Captain Torada (Hitoshi Ozawa) is set up to take down Gojo and expose his crimes. Torada is a tough as nails cop suspected of murder and is promised to be cleared of his accusations if together with his small team of Violent Crimes detectives, he can bring Gojo down.

Bad City is not quite the V-Cinema homage/throwback/love letter that its being touted as, sure it's low budget and captures a similar spirit and rambunctious energy that gave birth to a generation of auteurs, but it is also very much, for better or worse, a contemporary Japanese action film, with all the trappings that come with it. First and foremost though, it's a Hitoshi Ozawa vanity project, seeing the 60 year old genre veteran punch and smash his way through hordes of bad guys and thankfully on that front, its an absolute blast of a film, packed with lots of fun set pieces, violence and snarling genre faces who for the most part are excellent. But it's certainly held back from greatness by a bloated runtime and one instance of absolutely woeful miscasting.

The film couldn't open in a better way, as after Gojo is cleared of corruption charges, Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi's Seung-gi, naked and sporting a full body tattoo, massacres a bathhouse full of Yakuza, leaving the Sakurada Family almost annihilated and in ruins. In all honesty it's such a strong start that I was ready to go all in and give the film full marks straight from the get go, but the film quickly settled down after that and established itself as a nice and simple cops vs bad guys thriller as Director Kensuke Sonomura establishes a simple narrative with one purpose in mind, no doubt with his star and producer constantly looking over his shoulder. Have Hitoshi Ozawa be an absolute badass.

And this is where the film excels, despite promising a 'throwback Yakuza' storyline (it's neither of those things), it's ALL about Ozawa. In fact the Yakuza barely even feature in the story, outside of an excellent recurring character in Kazuki Namioka, who plays a Sakurada Yakuza out to avenge his Boss, this is all about the Korean mafia, with Director Sonomura seemingly taking a lot of cues from the incredible 'Asura: City of Madness' and using a similar plotline to put Ozawa in as many set pieces as possible. Despite getting the sense that he may be trying a little too hard and expecting fanfare after delivering every line, it's hard not to be impressed by him at 60 years old throwing down and performing some brilliantly choreographed fight scenes.

From using a megaphone to antagonize (and smash in the face) the remaining members of a crime outfit, to fighting off knife wielding assassins and brawling his way through an army of hired goons, Ozawa is doing it all himself, pulling from his years of experience and giving an excellent physical performance that goes above and beyond many other 'old man' action films, especially in the films breathtaking finale, I was particularly impressed to see him fighting his way up a flight of stairs, falling in some awkward, painful positions and taking it all in his stride. There is no doubt in my mind that any fans of his (of which there are many) are going to get a real kick out of this film.

It must be said too that Director Sonomura is a real talent to watch, not only does he have an excellent knack for directing action scenes, but the film as a whole looks and sounds great with special mention going to his editing of the fight scenes and keeping a focus on the action with a steady hand. Though one of my biggest complaints lies in the runtime, he could easily stand to lose a good 20 minutes of narrative filler here and the result would of been a much tighter and well balanced film overall, especially in some of the completely unnecessary sequences involving a reporter that are not only unnecessary, but really quite boring, which is a real shame when they're sandwiched inbetween such excellent action scenes.

My other complaint is the complete miscasting of Tak Sakaguchi. Mercifully, Director Sonomura has him be mute throughout the entire film, not even uttering groans, but he just doesn't have the intimidating presence that he's trying so very hard to convey, with neither the on-screen persona or physical presence to play the right hand man of a fearsome Korean Crime lord. He also makes his fight scenes feel very out of place and borderline silly/cringeworthy with his fighting stance. Sure, his feline-like stance and quick fluid movements are impressive when it comes to martial arts, but in a film that excels in its brawler action, with street fights and everyday weapons giving the action a gritty, grounded feel, it's contrasted so very starkly by Tak moving around like a cat and throwing such quick stabs, movements and dodging bullets(!?) that whenever he appeared I was taken out of the experience completely, sadly.

The rest of the cast though, to the films credit, is excellent almost across the board, with a number of genre veterans showing up throughout. Hitoshi Ozawa is terrific physically, but not only that he manages to rein himself in somewhat and deliver a decent performance, he's not chewing scenery and spitting it out and the film definitely benefits because of it. Opposite him as the villains, is Lily Franky, who gets the job done as the corrupt wannabe politician Gojo and Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi is brilliant as Korean gangster Seung-gi, an ambitious and bloodthirsty man who will stop at nothing to crush any who oppose him (full disclosure though, I'm a huge fan so probably biased).

Elsewhere there's Hideto Katsuya and Masanori Mimoto as Violent Crimes cops under Ozawa and both are very good, especially when on-screen together and special mention goes to fellow cop, Nohara, played by Akane Sakanoue, who is fantastic as the rookie cop on their team, trying to make her way in all male world and getting some terrific action scenes in the process, she's absolutely one of the films best assets. There's also smaller roles along the way for the likes of Masaya Kato, Dan Mitsu, Taro Suya and the aforementioned Kazuki Namioka (who is brilliant), and cameos for Hideo Nakano and Hitoshi's brother Kazuyoshi Ozawa. It's an impressive cast across the board and a real treat for genre fans.

Overall, Bad City is a great little film that succeeds in more places than it fails and despite its bloated runtime, it's packed with action that is very impressive for the most part. A strong recommend for action film fans and an essential watch for those of Hitoshi Ozawa, though if it was a little shorter and didn't have Tak Sakaguchi this would of been at least an 8/10 for me, possibly a touch higher even. Nevertheless though, when all is said and done, this is an impressive action film and if Sonomura can keep delivering like this, then he's a real talent to keep an eye on.

Paul's Take

Nathan has covered the plot and most of the meat of the film. Bad City is Japanese B-movie writ large. Cops vs Thugs, 2022 style. Maybe too large, it lacks the economy and synth-driven grace of the director's previous film Hydra. But it is still a fun time.

Bad City is basically just one of those mid-2000s Hong Kong cop movies, only this has a scowling Hitoshi Ozawa instead of someone like baby-faced Eken Cheng, but it's rougher and tougher than any of those slick movies. Ozawa himself came into my radar with the glorious 90s V-cinema action fest that was Score, a film that rips off a dozen American movies and uses some of the biggest squibs I've ever seen. Alas a lot of his roles lie collecting dust for us gwailos, unsubbed and unloved. Maybe one day, I'm pretty sure V-cinema in general must be an untapped gold mine for blogs like ours.

Back to this, the story keeps you engaged, and the action when it comes, is rough and ready but efficiently chaotic and forceful. The last half hour is a rollercoaster of brawls and bashing. Is it a classic? No, it is just a  bit too long in the tooth but it is a welcome change to nothing much like this out of Japan at all.