TETSUO : THE BULLET MAN

Office worker Anthony, son of an American father and a Japanese mother, lives in Tokyo with his wife Yuriko and their little son Tom. Since Anthony’s mother died of cancer, his scientist father has been overly fearful for their health and rigidly subjects Anthony and Tom to monthly physicals. Walking home, Tom is killed in a hit and run before Anthony’s eyes. Losing their boy pushes Yuriko over the edge and triggers violent emotions in Anthony, whose body begins to transform. Little by little, his cells turn to iron. When the driver who killed Tom reappears and Anthony learns the truth about his father’s past experiments on human guinea pigs and about his mother’s death, Anthony mutates into a mass of metal – a human weapon fuelled by an uncontrollable rage. The BIFFF was the first festival in the world to screen Tetsuo ( 1989 ) ; which has since become the cult gem we all know. So it would have been awkward to end this twenty-year adventure without showing the last episode of Tsukamoto’s trilogy. And our chap hasn’t lost an ounce of his talent : edgy editing, mystical inserts, sexualisation of the mechanical – reminiscent in some ways of Cronenberg’s Crash ( or is it the opposite ? ) –, industrial themes for the score ( thanks to Chu Ishikawa ) and Trent “Nine Inch Nails” Reznor for the soundtrack.