Kensuke Sonomura wastes no time in plunging us straight into the action with Bad City. On the surface, we’re introduced to Kaiko City, a town that seems to be past its glory days. It now withers away under the corruption of the financial corporations around it. The prosecutors bring it a tad lower. The Yakuza bring it to the depths of the dirt. Poverty stains the pavements of a city with great potential.
Despite my hopeless obsession with horror, I grew up on action films. They’re my dad’s happy place. He always used to say an action film can be made or broken by its stunts. Sonomura, being a fight choreographer and stunt director, is the best hands we could be in. It shows throughout the whole film. I’m blown away by the sheer technicality and slickness of the stunts. Big or small, the fights and stunts are like a violent ballet. Twisting and turning through the air with surgeon-like precision, Bad City is as good an exhibit of evidence as any that stunt work and fight choreography is a really fine art form. Sonomura was the action director for the Resident Evil games which explains why there’s something familiar about the completely intentionally frantic battles.
I could talk about the stunts forever but what underpins the meticulously choreographed violence is the journey of Wataru Gojo, a corrupt businessman who decides to run for mayor. With the help of Kim Seung-gi, an underground crime boss, a tirade of malicious, ferocious violence ensues. Sweeping through any political or mob rivals, both men see a mutual blood-soaked benefit in each other. We meet Gojo on the eve of his acquittal for bribery and collusion. Chairman of the Gojo Conglomerate, he saunters down a corridor to be met by Hirayama who swears the court case isn’t over.
The violent crime division decides there is only one man for the job. Toroda (Hitoshi Ozawa). A fallen police officer who is serving time for murder is released from prison and put in charge of a special task force. He stops at nothing to bring peace back to Kaiko City. Hitoshi Ozawa is one of the action genre’s biggest stars and I can see why. He has a tough vulnerability – if that is possible. He cruises through introspective scenes where he imparts life perspectives, as freely and as impactful as he does fight scenes. He leaves no line spared and adds richness to everything around him through his eyes.
We feel the protection all around Gojo before he even has to say he can’t be touched. He has a car waiting at any given point. He alludes to the sheer masculine thrill of catching a monster. The chase. That becomes the crux of the film, for me. Men chasing other men.
There are images that will stay with me forever. There is a juxtaposition between beauty and danger. In the opening frame, a man gets ready for his day. He washes soap off of his back to reveal a huge tattoo. He shaves. All in slow-motion, he is a moving sculpture. But what is he getting ready for? What are we observers of?
We’re not left with much time to figure this out. We have our first kill straight after. Sonomura expertly shows us vulnerability in the ordinary rituals we use to prepare for action. Contrasting it with the barbarity of assassination, I feel a sense of the tragedy of life and the things society has pushed people to do for wealth and for power. There is a deep sense of a loss of innocence. An absence of appreciation for the smaller things. Lofty power battles have replaced a glance out of a sunkissed window-sill. Violent showdowns have replaced the beauty of a walk. These men are not here for the small things and it is killing them.
One thing that stands out to me about this film is Sonomura’s gift of establishing characters succinctly. We feel the protection all around Gojo before he even has to say he can’t be touched. He has a car waiting at any given point. He alludes to the sheer masculine thrill of catching a monster. The chase. That becomes the crux of the film, for me. Men chasing other men. What happens when men’s dreams and aspirations clash with another’s of equal power? Whoever wins, stands triumphant.
The film packs a punch politically too. As most action films do, under the surface. The film hits on poverty, gentrification, and corporate greed and questions the difference between politicians, CEOs and organised crime syndicates. It asks big questions, whilst taking us on a thrill ride that I genuinely enjoyed.
Bad City is on DIGITAL PLATFORMS from the 6th March
