Silver - shirubaa (1999)

A vengeful woman uses special skills to find the gang that killed her family.

Director:

Takashi Miike

Writers:

Hisao Maki (comic), Hisao Maki (screenplay)

Stars:

Atsuko Sakuraba, Kenji Haga, Shinobu Kandori

Cast

Credited cast:
Atsuko Sakuraba	...	Jun Shirogane / Silver
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Kenji Haga
Shinobu Kandori
Rumi Kazama
Hisao Maki
Fujio Matsushima
Kôji Tsukamoto

Storyline

A vengeful woman uses special skills to find the gang that killed her family.

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Plot Keywords:

gym | kiss | man with glasses | unusual sex act | yakuza | 

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Romance | Thriller

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Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

21 September 1999 (Japan)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Cinema Paradise, Museum

Technical Specs

Runtime:

79 min

Color:

Color

User Reviews

Gonzo film-making on the cheap.

As a testament to Miike's productivity and versatility, in the same year that he finally broke big with Audition and Dead or Alive: Hanzaisha, he still had time to make a S&M-meets-martial arts cheapie like Silver. Truth be told, it's not very good. But it doesn't try to be, so no love lost I guess.

There's a very obvious made-for-TV/video feel and look that somehow suits the material and in the same time bellies Silver's intentions. And so does the paper thin storyline about a female wrestler/karate champ working as an undercover cop, trying to expose corruption in the higher echelons of Japanese society. The story is just a skeleton that Miike uses to hang on his S&M fetishes and cartoon-ish style, and the movie progresses through a series of loosely connected S&M and asskicking scenes. Heck, there's even a softcore scene complete with porn muzak and everything. As you can guess, Silver doesn't try to make a serious statement about corruption in society, even though a shoddy voice-over tries to sneak in a mention about "fear of god" and "not judging others".

Things are very simple here though. Silver is cheap and made to appeal to the fetish crowd. It's very low budget and unpolished (some bad CGI make it all the more obvious) but if BDSM with a dash of martial arts sounds cool to you then it's worth a look. I know I dug it. Plus it's very short too (clocking at a measly 78 minutes) so it doesn't outstay its welcome.