Shinji Muroi, "aka. The Suspect" was indeed a fascinating film, yet a film I didn't know exactly how to deal with. It tells about police brutality, corruption and murder investigation that seems to be doomed to failure. Only one man has courage to stand behind justice - Shinji Muroi! By stubbornly proceeding with investigation that head of police wants to discontinue, Muroi finds himself in a jail, and soon everything's in stake. The storyline was mostly good and characters were vivid. Toshiro Yanagiba does OK job as an honest man standing behind justice, but also a man possessing his own traumas. His performance is good, but doesn't go anywhere near as Takeshi Kitano would do in his sheer silent expression. Somehow Muroi can't just convey that much, although without a question he also has his moments. Other characters were mostly good, especially the spoiled school girl accused of murder. I was annoyed that the prosecutors were made bunch of such lunatics instead of real hard emotionless pushers (as they are in real world). Some other characters were also too much out of a cartoon, like the old long bearded guy who Muroi met in the ferris wheel. But I guess the underlying Bayside Shakedown franchise requires characters to be silly like this. The defending attorney's character is well built however and Rena Tanaka was very convincing as a girl who was once hurt by police. Her naive character is just perfect to stand aside rock solid honest Muroi. But, because of her personal trauma, she hates police big time.. The focal point of the story seems to wrap around this detail. It is interesting to realize why they made movie like this in Japan, which pretty much questions the purity of police. As an institution, police doesn't have that good image in Japan, true. It is known how harsh and brutal police can be and common people try to avoid getting into touch with police. I suspect movie like this couldn't be made in US. Another interesting point is to realize how different Japanese movies are nowadays. Past four years, Japan has produced plenty of movies with big budget, movies with western soundtracks, movies that look Hollywood movies. Take Yamato or AFTER for example. Indeed the soundtrack of Shinji Muroi also proved this right - in Japanese movies you always expect something a bit lighter or simply different. Maybe that's why it felt confusing to hear Super Dramatic Soundtrack in a movie like this. From the beginning helicopter scene that depicts Tokyo (which was like out of NYPD!) soundtrack is as heavy and moody as in any Joel Silver or Hans Zimmer production. "Am I watching Japanese movie here?" I wondered. Yes, this movie certainly could have used more realistic attitude. Although this story feels like something what could actually happen in real world, it seems silly that they spoiled it with loading it with too much unnecessary romantic scenes. Scenes like that ferris wheel seemed over-dramatic in a way - and why hard bunch of people like police would meet in a distant ferris wheel up in the mountains? A backseat of a Toyota Crown would suit better, plus would be safer and faster. Although end with a blizzard in airport is romantic and moody, it's too long. Unnecessary highlighting and underlining of Shinji Muroi reduces my score down one notch, while otherwise this would have been worth of solid eight stars. But I do have to admit that Shinji Muroi seems to be a guy who deserves some underlining in Japan. Toshiro Yanagiba became popular in Bayside Shakedown (TV series of Fuji Television) which was a super big hit, and resulted bunch of blockbuster movies.
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