Tokyo Fist

From Shinya Tsukamoto, the director of the cult techno-grunge sci-fi Tetsuo films (Iron Man and Body Hammer), this Raging Bull Goes to Japan effort features the director as Tsuda, an insurance salesman whose drudge-like existence gets an adrenaline shot in the arm when an old school chum turned boxing pro re-enters his life and--unfortunately, his fiancee Hizuru's. Combining testosterone and adrenaline (not the best mixture), Tsuda decides to fight left hook with left hook, so to speak, and embarks on a rather sadomasochistic training program which eventually pits him against his erstwhile buddy turned romantic nemesis. As is often the case, the subtitles here are more entertaining than the actual movie (viewers will see such tortured syntactical offerings as "how dare the bitch talked to me like that?," "a piece of a cake" and "I said, what's all about this?"). Towards the end, when Tsuda and Hizuru stand and hammer the crapola out of each other, I too was wondering, "what's all about this?" Not a necessary purchase. (R. Pitman)