Three people in Tokyo take a surreal voyage of self-discovery through memory and nightmares. "O" intends suicide while talking on a cell-phone with a stranger he meets on line who plans a simultaneous suicide. Events take a horrifying turn. Keiko Kirishima is a cool, seemingly emotionless police detective, brilliant but off-putting. She's faced with two mutilated corpses who appear to have killed themselves, but she's not sure. A cell-phone number links the deaths. She calls on Akumu Tantei, a poor and suicidal young man who has the ability to enter people's dreams.
So, I have finally seen the first Nightmare Detective (I wrote about the second one a long time ago) and can conclude that it's a pretty damn good duo of films. I really, really liked the sequel and since then I've had a hard time getting hold of this one. Here, Shinya Tsukamoto (Tetsuo: The Iron Man) is just as amazing without his usually overly shaky camera and unconventional film style and uses a more traditional narrative format, a mystery thriller with his own cool fantasy twist. In other words, even if you couldn't get into his more crazy stuff such as Bullet Ballet (1998) or Tokyo Fist (1995), you should still definitely check out both Nightmare Detective films.
Genre: Fantasy/Horror/Thriller
