Fudoh: The Next Generation (1996)

[Mr_Vindictive]

Fudoh: The Next Generation....sounds like a sequel to a bad foreign film about some type of new martial art, doesn't it?  Actually, Fudoh is a kick ass yakuza film by none other than Takashi Miike.  

The film starts off with a young boy named Ricki.  His father is the head of the Fudoh clan, a yakuza gang in Japan.  His oldest son Ryu, whom Ricki looks up to, is running the gang.  One day, after one of their men is killed by a rival gang, Ryu orders a hit on one of the rival leaders.  This seriously p**ses off the other yakuza gangs, and they call on Ryu's father to right the situation.

He does so by chopping off his son's head and presenting it to the leaders at a meeting.

Young Ricki watches this all happen.

Fast forward about ten years, and Ricki is now about 18 years old and is in high school.  But, he's not an ordinary student.  Without his father's knowledge, he's running his own yakuza gang, and doing so quite brutally.  He has a gang of assasin children, all around the age of 8 or so, and a group of ass kicking school girls who are more than willing to take out anyone in Ricki's way.  

Although this is an early Miike film, it's without a doubt one of his strongest works.  I went into the film assuming that since it was a film he did before he got into his groove, that it would be less graphic/strange as his other films, but that assumption was a big mistake.  Miike brings on the weirdness in this one, without a doubt.  One of the strangest things in the film, is one of Ricki's female bodyguards.  She works as a stripper on her off time, and has the amazing ability to stick a blowgun into her.....umm....you know... and then blow darts out of it at an enemy.  The film even shows us what this is like while she's on her period.

So, if you read that and got weirded out, then don't see Fudoh.  That's only the beginning as things get much more strange and surreal.  But, if you are a fan of Miike's other over the top films (mainly Ichi The Killer) then check this one out, as it has much of the same vibe.  Overall it's a great film that even sets itself up for a sequel, but apparently none were ever made.  That, my friends, is a shame.

9/10

[ToyMan]

if you liked fudoh or ichi the killer, you might also like the "dead or alive" trilogy, also by miike.