K-20 ENGLISH-FRIENDLY HONG KONG DVD Review

Every now-and-again someone tries to revive the dashing crime-fighting hero movies of old, but most fall just short of true greatness.

 

"The Rocketeer"

"Darkman"

"The Shadow"

 

In each of the examples above there is a lot to like. Each of these films has a certain vision attached to it, some meticulously staged action sequences and a detailed (alternate) universe as a background. But the "dashing" part unfortunately seems to be damn hard to achieve. Pardon me but if your film is about a Zorro-clone I want him to be cunning and nearly all-powerful, not wimpy, stupid, cowardly or worse: boring.

 

Which brings us to the recent Japanese masked villain/hero caper "K-20". With Takeshi Kaneshiro in the lead, at least the "dashing part" cannot go wrong.

Or can it?

The Story:

The setting is Japan in 1949, in a world where World War II has been narrowly averted. Instead, Japan's age of "New Nobility" has continued for decades, creating a huge rift between the rich upper classes and the downtrodden poor.

Yet a mysterious thief known only as "K-20" has been making waves. A catburgler who is also a master of disguises, he's been stealing priceless objects from the rich. Worse, he gloats to the press about it and openly taunts the police despite a nationwide manhunt.

But K-20 has a sinister plan, one which demands he disappears from public view. So he frames a talented but dimwitted acrobat called Heikichi, planting fake evidence and (literally) making the poor guy fall into the unkind hands of the police.

 

However, with help from his circus friends Heikichi manages to escape and starts hunting K-20 to prove his own innocence. His biggest asset is that he knows K-20's next target: the betrothed of the very detective who is in charge of recapturing Heikichi...

 

	The Movie:   "K-20" starts off with one of the most promising shots ever: a huge police zeppelin floats above a city and discharges its load of four helicopters, which fly over a vast area of slums and industrial complexes before arriving at the rich city center. Next you see one of K-20's daring heists and the flashy opening credits, and you'll be inclined to sit back, relax and expect something insanely cool. Designs especially look nice: the rich part of the Japanese capital looks like a nineteen-thirties version of Shanghai and the technology looks as if it's rooted into the first half of the Twentieth Century.   But then we arrive at our hero. A naive acrobat hunting for the thief who framed him? That sounds as if twenty years ago this would have been a perfect role for Jackie Chan, and that feeling never really leaves you during the film. Who we get though is Takeshi Kaneshiro, and he's neither a gymnast nor a stuntman. Sure, there are some nice stunts and chases in the film but do we ever get the impression that it's our leading character doing all this? Ehmmmm... not really.   Now don't get me wrong: I certainly do not expect every actor to do his (or hers) own stunts. However I do expect to feel involved with what happens to the lead, and in this case the audience is kept pretty much at a distance. As a character Heikichi is being railroaded all the time, first into being a patsy for K-20 and then into becoming his own savior. Instead of dashing this utter lack of control makes him fiercely uninteresting, and even Kaneshiro cannot inject enough charm into this guy to make us feel his plight. In fact Heikichi is such a self-centered socially blind moron that after his escape you keep wondering why the "poor people" keep helping this oaf as if he is their "prophesied champion-to-be". Now whenever this would happen in a Jackie Chan film (which is often) at least you knew the emphasis would be on some wicked stunts he'd be performing himself, but that is not the case here and the first half of the film makes you wonder why it focuses on the least interesting person in it. Thankfully when Heikichi starts taking on K-20 for real a lot of this evaporates as he suddenly gets both smarter and more human. It might not be consistent (or really earned) but at least we finally get a hero worth rooting for.   Next is the art direction which is extremely nice but used in small doses. What is there looks good, but "K-20" is a long movie (137 minutes) and it keeps returning to the same few sets, which make the film seem rather cheap. It all takes place in an alternate universe but the reason for this never really becomes clear. Was all of this necessary just to create an artificial class divide and to couple a Thirties' look with Fifties' helicopters? No doubt the novel on which the movie is based sheds more light on this, but the casual viewer is left scratching his head.

 

But for all of my grumblings above I have to admit I liked "K-20" a lot. When the Heikichi character finally starts to allow it Takeshi Kaneshiro works his usual magic, and Tôru Nakamura is a worthy ally/adversary as Kogoro Akechi, the chief of police who hunts both Heikichi and K-20. Stealing a few scenes as well is Jun Kunimura as Genji "the Gimmick".

As for the technology on display: the zeppelins are criminally underused but the large McGuffin here is the Tesla Engine, an energy transmitter rumored to be responsible for the 1905 Tunguska explosion in Siberia, and the unveiling of this device made the nerd in me smile in a big way.

Also, the finale is pretty good and manages to salvage a lot of the earlier damage.

 

All in all "K-20" is almost great. It's nice, it's even pretty good in places, but like so many others it fails to be the classic you hope for after seeing the first few minutes. Directed by Shimako Sato (who also adapted the novel into a script herself) of "Unfair" fame, it does make me take notice of what she'll do next...

 

 

Conclusion:

 

In the top part of this review I listed some enjoyable but imperfect titles, and "K-20" fits snuggly between these. It never quite manages to shake the "low-budget blockbuster" nor does it make us really care all that much about its characters. However, it IS certainly enjoyable to watch, and as the defects might be caused by "origin-story blues" I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel appear in the future...

 

 

About the DVD:

 

CN Entertainment Ltd. has released "K-20" on a single R3 NTSC disc. I repeat: this disc is NOT regionfree so make sure your player can handle region three discs if you think about buying this. Visuals are good, for sound you have the choice between a nice rumbly Japanese DD-5.1 and a nice and even more rumbly Japanese DTS track. For those so inclined there is a Cantonese stereo dub as well. The English subtitles are very good.

 

As for extras: there is a gallery of 8 stills from the movie, and that's it. Not even a trailer.

 

So I declare this disc barebones, but with good A/V for the main attraction.