Nightmare Detective

Colour, 35 mm
Japan, 2006, 106 min
Section: Midnight Screenings

Synopsis

Police in an unnamed Japanese metropolis are left flustered by some strange deaths. From behind the apparent suicides emerges a man with the mysterious name of “0” who the victims called from their mobile phones just before their deaths. “0” was then able to enter into their dreams and kill them both there and in reality. The investigation takes place over two storylines: while the detectives are looking for the murderer in the real world, their young colleague Keiko, who is on her first field case, is tasked with stopping him in the dream world. She therefore elicits the co-operation of a suicidal young man traumatised from childhood who is able to enter into the dreams of others. In this, his 10th film, Shinya Tsukamoto enriches his peculiar form of poetics on estranged relationships, cold modern architecture, and extreme forms of corporeality with a plot not unlike that of the horror series A Nightmare on Elm Street.

About the director

Shinya Tsukamoto (b. 1960, Tokio) was already making 8mm movies in secondary school, where he also began taking an interest in the theatre. He later made a living making commercials and commercial films, and had a try at just about all of the film trades from lighting, through editing, to production. He won cult status with Tetsuo (1989), the story of a clerk who gradually turns into a pile of metal. Its sequel, Tetsuo II: Body Hammer (1992) was also a success. His films Tokyo Fist (1995), Gemini (Sôseiji, 1999) and Snake of June (Rokugatsu no hebi, 2002) were screened at the Karlovy Vary IFF. Tsukamoto often acts in his own films and those of his colleagues, such as in Ichi the Killer (Koroshiya 1, 2001) by Takashi Miike. His work and unmistakable poetic style is acknowledged by directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Gaspar Noé, and Darren Aronofsky.