Pointing with Guns

Takashi Iishi's Black Angel (Kuro no Tenshi) is a stylish, yet rather fragmentary yakuza thriller. In the story, the orphaned Ikko has become of age, and has come back to Japan from the US to revenge the murder of her parents. Including well-cut hair, pointing guns at the pool and tough men with baseball bats at the local game hall, the movie proceeds from a killing to another, fueled by personal traumas, lust, greed and alliances.

In the back cover, the director Iishi is said to be "More inventive than Quentin Tarantino". However, I think that even though Ikko resembles Black Mamba in Kill bill as a vengeful and stylish heroine, and the fighting scenes are quite aesthetic, the film is not even near the ingeniously paced and coherent work of Tarantino. Despite some interesting ideas in for example in the context of action, the fighting seems to have comparatively little coreography. What is more, even the motives of the main characters are presented somewhat too briefly, and sometimes the scenes seem to change quite abruptly, in the end making the film a series of flashbacks.

While watching Black Angel, my concentration was riveted at one moment (for example due to the explicit sex scenes), yet lost the next, I felt convinced at one time and doubting the strength of the characters at another. I have not seen any more Iishi's directing, but I am curious about the yakuza film genre. I find the set of clichés from drowning men at the harbor, the neat suits and tough ladies quite faschinating. The movie seemed typical, yet promising elaboration of that genre, but to me, was not a particularly enlightening experience.