Beyond Outrage

The middle film of Kitano's Outrage trilogy. Otomo was stabbed in prison in the first one; here he turns out to be alive and close to release, which makes the Sanno family nervous. This time the story is driven by a policeman rather than the yakuza. Detective Kataoka works the strings to set the Sanno and Hanabishi families against each other, and everyone acts on what they take to be someone else's move. Kitano's actual subject is not crime but hierarchy: who bows to whom, who apologises, who cuts off a finger. Kitano wrote, directed and edited it, and plays Otomo. Toshiyuki Nishida, Tomokazu Miura, Ryo Kase and Fumiyo Kohinata are in the cast. It premiered in Venice on 3 September 2012. The violence is sparser than in the first film but more abrupt; Kitano still refuses to shoot the build-up and shows you the aftermath instead. Who it is for: viewers who saw the first film and like dry, unfeeling gangster cinema. Who it is not for: anyone who has not seen Outrage. It introduces nobody and the names come fast, and there is almost no woman in it.