Things I Watched: The World of Kanako - Stop The World, I Want To Get Off

Last night I watched The World of Kanako which is to be honest a pretty insane movie. Often you get movies that are kind of slightly insane but never overstep the mark fully. Well, this one does. It’s a hyper-stylised, bloodthirsty, marauding thriller. It revels in excess, bloodthirsty violence and would be an utterly terrible choice of movie for a first date.

The film tells the story tale of an absent father who returns home after several years to look for his estranged daughter Kanako. Much of the film is spent watching him roam the streets of Tokyo looking for leads. At one point he ends up running into with a bunch of hipster teenagers who somehow control gangland. There's corrupt police everywhere and somewhere in the middle is Kanako, seemingly the most prescient part of the puzzle.

What follows is a twisted fairy-tale that focuses on unconscious drives leading towards madness. Not only are the aesthetics stylised, but it couples an absurdly high level of violence with splashes of cartoon blood just for fun. There are literally dozens of scenes in which characters gets beaten to within an inch of his life, brutally maimed or even raped. Somehow the main character, Akikazu survives it even though his white suit doesn't.

To be honest the plot makes less sense as it goes on but I get the feeling it never intended to be make sense to begin with. It's more interested in depicting a bleak world where colourful clothing and upbeat music juxtapose deeper psychological scars. It's all best exemplified by Akikazu: the anti-hero protagonist who chases violence with glee; like he's looking for nothing less than the death and destruction his daughter wishes upon him.

It's a hard film to like but it's also hugely interesting. A gorgeous and horrifying blood-ridden neon-dive into a world ruled by the darker elements of the human psyche.

//