‘Broken Rage’ Prime Video Movie Review - Takeshi Kitano Makes Fun of the Current Cinematic Landscape

With Broken Rage, writer-director-actor Takeshi Kitano makes fun of the franchise-hungry movie industry through gangster clichés. He first gives us a thriller about a hitman who is asked to infiltrate a drug ring as an undercover agent. This is followed by a spin-off of this short film, in which the tone is changed, but the "main story" remains intact. I have used quotation marks because there is nothing like a story in Broken Rage. Kitano has removed essential elements like tension, music, suspense, titillating violence - basically all the flab - from his film to reveal that the filmmakers have been feeding you the same old things by adding superficial embellishments. Kitano's Mouse doesn't have a backstory, a family, or a close friend. He simply exists like a cardboard cutout of a "movie hitman," going through the usual routine of a movie character. Mouse does his job, collects his pay, gets caught by two police officers, infiltrates a gang, and gets his freedom in the end. These events unfold with mechanical energy and are displayed through a static camera that merely observes everything like a mute spectator.

In the thriller portions, the humor is present beneath the surface. The unvarnished images are like statements that say, "You have seen this all before, with excess of sex and violence." Kitano forces us to confront our tastes so that we can clearly see the kinds of films we cherish and how we are converting mediocrity into box office success. During the spin-off portions, the mood becomes comical because the practice of churning out spin-offs in recent years has turned into a funny business. Almost every film is produced with a vision of creating a franchise. And just about any character, no matter how unremarkable, ends up getting a movie or a show tracing their origin story or something else (perhaps, a solo adventure focusing on their journey after the "main event?"). Did we need a spin-off of the thriller about Kitano's Mouse with a plot as old as the mountains? What's more, the "new film" treads on the same ground as its predecessor. The cinematic machine is currently busy dispensing and expanding pointless productions.

Not everything works, however. During the climax of the spin-off, when the actors start improvising and breaking their characters, you feel as if Kitano has run out of ideas. He doesn't know how to end the short, so he throws his hands in the air. Through those "black screen chats," Kitano pokes fun at the film's emptiness but also comes across as unconfident. He is aware that many people will dismiss Broken Rage as...broken. Nonetheless, instead of trusting and committing to his instincts, he tries to cushion his fall by criticizing himself. I have not seen any other Takeshi Kitano film, but after reading Roger Ebert's review of Hana-bi/Fireworks, I got the impression that the filmmaker likes to make movies that do not have flab. Something like Broken Rage could have easily looked like an incompetent film school project by an amateur student, and there are moments when it seems as if Kitano is busy (or maybe not?) making a statement. What saves Broken Rage from ending up as a dud, a disaster, is Kitano's discipline. The movie might look effortless from the outside, but if you observe closely, you will find a filmmaker in superb control of his vision. Broken Rage cannot be completely dismissed - it's made with care and attention. Takeshi Kitano leaves you with mixed feelings. His action-comedy is definitely...something.

Final Score- [6/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times