‘Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo’ Review: Takashi Miike Serves Up a Bloody, Filthy, Very Spicy Meatball
Have any other NC-17 movies besides Bad Lieutenant launched a whole film series? Probably not, but I find it hilarious that Abel Ferrara’s gritty, cult-classic, NYC-set character piece starring Harvey Keitel as a nameless scummy cop, extracting the last remnant of his soul and rattling his Catholicism towards redemption, has become IP. Yet everyone who has taken the mantle of the [snickers] “property” personalizes it with their own vision and direction. Werner Herzog committed to the comedy with Nicolas Cage (without even watching the original) in Port of Call New Orleans. Takashi Miike got his hands on the idea and spun it into a twisted, sick roller-coaster ride. If you’re going to make a new Bad Lieutenant, you’d better be a filmmaker as fucked up as the titular character. So it’s only right that Mr. Ichi the Killer did his thing.
Many of Ferrara’s main ideas are twisted in Miike’s Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo, a gory, blood-soaked neo-noir, and that shit is doused with coke to create a kinetic, adrenaline-fueled thrill ride. One could call this a remake or reimagining, but it stands out on its own by showing how a man’s path of self-destruction can’t be so bad when his orbit is as sick as he is (if not more).
Image copyright (©) Courtesy of NEON
MPA Rating: R (for strong bloody violence, grisly images, sexual content, drug use, and language.)
Runtime: 1 Hour and 48 Minutes
Language: English, Japanese
Production Companies: Recorded Picture Company, Pressman Film, Nippon Television, OLM
Distributor: Neon
Director: Takashi Miike
Screenwriter: Daisuke Tengan
Cast: Shun Oguri, Lily James, Liv Morgan, Shotaro Mamiya, Shūhei Nomura, Nanase Nishino, Yuka Kouri, Takanori Iwata, Keisuke Watanabe, Hideo Nakano, Jun Murakami, Jun Kunimura, Hiroshi Tachi
U.S Release Date: TBA
If the nameless lieutenant were reborn as a Japanese man cursed to repeat the same cycle, he’d be Yabuki (Shun Oguri), a methhead, deadbeat dad who spends his late nights playing pool with Korean prostitutes and increasing his gambling-addicted debt with the yakuza while being an informant for them. Haunted by the death of his partner, the man is in the midst of a downward spiral towards nothingness. He’s so far gone that he hallucinates himself at a pristine oasis, dipping his feet into the water, only to realize they’re dipped in a dark alleyway puddle. Meanwhile, a serial killer from Yabuki’s past, Kit-Chan (Shotaro Mamiya), is released from prison with a vengeance, leaving meatballs in their wake (I’m dead serious). While evading this, Yabuki is paired with an FBI agent, Gwen (Lily James), who’s searching for a politician’s missing daughter (Liv Morgan).
Miike makes the filth look friggin’ gorgeous.
Shun Oguri in BAD LIEUTENANT TOKYO | courtesy of NEON
Miike’s Tokyo stands apart visually with a kinetic, stylized coat and a neon- and sepia-coated grit that rounds out the seedy environment. Updating the material for contemporary times, he captures the old-school ‘70s noir spirit with passionate pastiche and nods to Japanese action flicks. It’s gritty and feels like classic grunge punk noir without leaving it at the aesthetic.
For the most part, Yabuki’s familiar arc fits into the neo-noir mold, delving into an intense, pulpy underbelly shrouded in grotesque imagery. Miike imbues the environment with such poetic filth and edge without unabashedly reaching for shock value; it’s embedded in its own little realm. I couldn’t stop thinking: “Man, I’m sickened but intrigued.” Though this was my first Miike film, I could tell it’s not his sickest. There are a few fun, grisly action sequences, but they are few and far between, though more frequent near the end of the movie.
Screenwriter Daisuke Tengan, who also worked with Miike on 13 Assassins and Audition, takes variables from its source and shapes them to fit the action mold. Though it has far too many moving parts for its own good, he shapes an optimistic iteration of the material, tethering a Buddhist-centric spin on karmic justice.
Like the lieutenants who came before him, Oguri is enthralling to watch. He matches a stern, confident demeanor with shameless patheticism. He’s more of a loser than Cage and Keitel but is a signature of the titular character, drenched in sweat and depravity. Unlike them, he could be considered slightly likable, mostly because of the film’s optimistic theme. Oguri is compelling in making Yabuki’s slow-as-molasses rise to heroism triumphant.
Lily James is woefully miscast in a movie that needed a real badass.
Lily James in BAD LIEUTENANT TOKYO | courtesy of NEON
People are watching international movies more than ever these days, so when I say this movie didn’t need Lily James, I’m admitting that she bogs the film down. Her Gwen, a hard-edged, slightly bigoted Southern woman, arrives far into a film that was already doing well on its own. When she and Oguri pair up, you can see what Tengan was trying to do, and how they mirror each other. But God, the English actress is out of her depth, delivering a horrible Southern accent so mumbled it needs subtitles for English viewers. She’s trying to serve badass in every frame but looks like that kid trying way too hard to look cool. I respect her for stepping out of her element, as she’s never taken on a genre project like this, and it desperately needed a proficient action veteran to make it work. Think Lena Headey or Zoë Bell. Or perhaps I don’t know an actual Southern American. Though I admire what it was going for and what beats it takes, the cultural politics behind it are muddled, if not a bit sour.
Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo has far too many moving parts. It tries to force the different elements onto each other, like trying to fit a square in a triangular hole. The noir elements are already strong and functioning on their own, and James’ arrival further convolutes the story. From there, the film becomes monotonous and repetitive as you wait for the action to erupt and the different threads to finally intersect.
All in all, Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo is an entertaining and blood‑soaked ride that captures the grimy spirit of its predecessors while forging its own twisted path. Takashi Miike’s kinetic direction and Oguri’s compelling performance make it worth the trip, even if Lily James’ misstep and the film’s overstuffed plot keep it from reaching its full potential. Frankly, as someone with acid reflux, the film’s like a spicy meatball that doesn’t go down easily but is worth the bite.
