Asakusa Kid

Before Takeshi Kitano was famous he ran the lift at a strip club in Asakusa. The club's comedian, Fukami Senzaburo, takes him on as an apprentice and teaches him the stage, timing, how to read a room. Then television arrives, Takeshi rises, and Fukami's stage closes. The film is really the story of those two curves running in opposite directions. Directed by Gekidan Hitori, it is based on the memoir Kitano wrote in 1992. The director has said he worked on the script for six years. The telling treats the master and apprentice relationship with nostalgia while also showing what success costs: what is left for the teacher once the student passes him. Yuya Yagira plays the young Kitano and Yo Oizumi plays Fukami. It went up on Netflix on 9 December 2021. Who it's for: Anyone interested in Takeshi Kitano, Japanese stage comedy, and master and apprentice stories. Who it's not for: If you want Kitano's years as a director, the film never goes there, and the telling stays inside familiar biopic shapes.