20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Takeshi Kitano's early masterpiece, 9 July 2002
This review is from: Boiling Point [1990] [DVD] (DVD)
I first saw this film by mistake, about six years ago. A friend of mine bought it thinking it was a John Woo style HK action film. Despite the geographical similarity nothing could be further from the truth, Boiling Point is a wonderfully dark, brutal and often disturbingly funny Japanese gangster film, about the exploits of a young loser attempting to buy a gun in order to avenge his humiliation at the the hands of the local Yakuza. Thats about all there is to the plot, as with all Kitano's films its more about atmosphere and emotion than uneccessarily convoluted plot and million dollar CGI effects and stunts. I can't recomend Boiling Point enough, along with Kitanos more recent Brother and films like Ring, Audition and Battle Royale, Japan is currently making some of the best films in the world.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Good Film, Egregious DVD Transfer by Tokyo Bullet, 12 Jan 2009
This review is from: Boiling Point [1990] [DVD] (DVD)
This is a good film, quite slow but rewarding. Fans of Kitano will know what to expect, and will not be disappointed.
The DVD is another matter. Tokyo Bullet have done a very poor job of transferring this work to DVD.
Firstly, the picture is washed-out and lacking in detail. That may be forgivable by some, given the low price.
Far worse is that some aspect of the remastering has caused the picture to lose fidelity at various points - the degradation is most extreme when faces are moving across the screen. I believe this to be the result of a cack-handed attempt at noise-reduction on the part of the transfer engineers (which would be consistent with the washed-out picture). Whatever the case, the problem is very noticeable, and very distracting.
Boo!
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Respect kills as quickly as humiliation cripples, 8 May 2010
This review is from: Boiling Point [1990] [DVD] (DVD)
Slow, ponderous, but far more than a quick wipe, this film is a thick absorbing towel. Managing to make baseball interesting for someone who yawns on instinct, when American sports are mentioned, is one spectacular achievement. This details revenge and camaraderie within the prison of alienation. The garage attendant, the man of no confidence finds courage to anhilate the local thugs. The film illuminates the dirty back streets of Japan where neon signs do not shine and shopping malls are a cultural erasure.
Violence rears in blasts, sometimes comic, mostly gruesome. Woman beating, rape, homosexual bullying is revealed as commonplace, no big deal, just a backdrop. This is how it is. In between are comic events producing howls of laughter. Other moments when I shielded my eyes, with gut, wrenching agony.
The garage attendant threads his path through this film to the non predictable inevitable end. The camerwork, the jumps in story, the comic events are Tarratinoesque. Japan's sense of film artistry and audiences willingess to follow just appears light years ahead of western mainstream kino kulture. Now 20 years old, apart from the cars and the TV's it has a modern sensibility.
This is not a film for teenagers or those who want quick resolutions. Beat Takeshi plays one of the meanest screen boyfriends ever without appearing overwrought. People not deemed to be the incrowd are expendable, whilst true to life, counters American buddy inclusiveness. It is slow, nasty and dark but never dull. Masculine need respect is the biggest suicide killer across the planet. This film details the minutae of the process and the end result.
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