Detective Story (2007)

Detective Story opens with a white-haired man feeding bodily organs into a blender. After they’ve been squished and chopped into a chunky kind of liquid, the once-human substance is used to paint a bizarre abstract work of art. Other twisted paintings surround the artist, most mixing religious iconography with scenes of dismembered limbs. Yeah, sounds like a Takashi Miike film to me.

Raita Takashima (Kurouda Maki) is a reserved-yet-brilliant hacker who’s moving into a new apartment. As it turns out, his next-door neighbor, Raita Kazama (Kazuya Nakayama), also shares the same first name. This Raita happens to be a detective, and he’s far more outgoing than Mr. Takashima would care for. Maybe it’s just me, but doesn’t Nakayama bear a slight resemblance to an Asian Gregory Peck in certain shots?

Later, Kazama is visited at his apartment by Manami Inoue, a young woman who needs his help. He tells her to come to his office the following morning, as he’s far too preoccupied with bothering his new neighbor. Mrs. Inoue departs, but she’s murdered on her way home and has her liver removed. More victims follow. When Kazama becomes a suspect in the murders, he must find the real killer in order to clear his name. Takashima gets drawn in because off his budding romance with Mika, Kazama’s assistant.

But who’s the real killer? Is it the white-haired man shown at the beginning of the film? You know, the one painting pictures with human remains. We’re led to believe that this is none other than Yuki Aoyama, a famous painter also known as the “Master of Tragedy” and the “Artist of Madness.” In fact, one character wonders aloud who the killer could be, and we immediately cut to a photograph of the artist. Either Miiki is removing all doubt as to the madman’s identity, or else he’s laying on the red herrings awfully thick.

And when it comes to suspects, let’s not forget about the young man occasionally shown in front of his computer, drooling over various spy camera shots of unsuspecting women. Is he the killer, a pervert, or just some random guy that Miiki decided to throw into the narrative at key moments? Honestly, none of the above would surprise me.

And since the director’s throwing in elements of various American crime and buddy cop films, why not go all the way and include a character inspired by Hannibal Lecter? It seems that Kazama busted this nutjob back when he was still a cop, and he’s hoping to “get clues about a maniac from a maniac.” Wearing a mask which reminds one of Metropolis, the madman does provide some valuable information which Kazama predictably doesn’t decipher until the last possible moment. Just once, I’d like to see the brilliant movie psychopath who’s actually a big fan of straight talk. Maybe if Dr. Phil ever decides to get into acting (his role in Scary Movie 4 not withstanding).

Miiki is certainly an ambitious and brave director, but his work on Detective Story is beyond sloppy. We cut to extreme close-ups of characters for one or two seconds for absolutely no reason, endure numerous jump cuts which make the film look like amateur hour, and witness zooms straight out of the ‘70s. Robert Rodriguez used that last technique effectively in Planet Terror, but it was meant as a deliberate tribute to grindhouse cinema. I wish I could say the same for Miike.

Detective Story is all over the place when it comes to the tone of the film. At times, it seems intended as a horror film, while other moments make the two Raitas out to be a couple of zany morons. At one point, Raita Kazama even winks directly at the audience. Silence of the Lambs this isn’t.

The acting isn’t much better, and many of the scenes seem to go nowhere. The standout Miiki moment comes when Takashima and Mika attend an art gallery to view the works of Aoyama. She begins to leave the room, and he asks her where she’s going. She responds that she’s going to pee, and then we quickly cut to a shot of her legs and feet, where urine begins running down her leg. Back to Mika’s smiling face, where she explains that she couldn’t hold it. Moments later, she’s hung up a makeshift clothesline in the bathroom to allow her soiled skirt, shoes and panties to dry out. Now that’s just damn bizarre, but fans of Miiki should expect no less.

Detective Story is one I would only recommend for hardcore devotees of Takashi Miiki. It’s poorly directed, poorly acted, and contains an abrupt and nonsensical ending. The final confrontation with the killer goes on for too long, and the script seems to have been written by someone on a caffeine and American detective movie binge. It’s a car wreck of a film, but you may still find yourself peeking at the wreckage from time to time.