Release Date

December, 11th, 2004

Running Time

121 min

Genre

Feature

Color

Color

Screening Format

35mm

Screen Size

-

Sound Processing

-

[ Directed by ]

• HIRAYAMA Hideyuki

[ Produced by ]

• ISHIHARA Kiyoyuki

[ Cast ]

• WATARI Tetsuya ── Monoi Seizou
• NAGATSUKA Kyozo ── Shiroyama Kyosuke
• TOKUSHIGE Satoshi ── Goda Yuichiro

[ Staff ]

• CHONG Wishing ── Screenplay
• TAKAMURA Kaoru ── Original Story

[ Production Company ]

NIKKATSU, TOEI, Mainichi Newspapers, TV Asahi, Aoi Advertising Promotion, The Sports Nippon Newspapers, Nippan

[ Story ]

Shiroyama (Nagatsuka Kyozo), the president of major brewing corporation, Hinode Beer, is kidnapped by a mysterious group who call themselves "Lady Joker", but is strangely released without incident soon after. Unbeknownst to the police, the kidnappers have demanded that Hinode pay 2 billion yen to guarantee the safety of the true target: 3,500,000 kiloliters of Hinode's beer. In order to protect their livelihoods, the brewery's executives decide to secretly comply with Lady Joker's demands. A young detective (Tokushige Satoshi) assigned to protect Hinode's president suspects that all is not what it seems and begins his own investigation while his colleagues are led on a merry chase by the extortionists. In fact, Lady Joker is actually nothing more than a disparate alliance formed by the elderly owner of a small drug store (Watari Tetsuya), a truck driver (Osugi Ren), a young factory worker (Kato Haruhiko), an ethnic Korean financial expert (Fukikoshi Mitsuru) and a cynical rogue cop (Kikkawa Koji).
Prolific filmmaker Hirayama Hideyuki (A Laughing Frog, Samurai Resurrection) adeptly directs this multi-layered crime thriller that addresses social injustices inherent in Japanese society.

[ Contact (International) ]

Nikkatsu Corporation
International Sales
3-28-12 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033
Attn: KAWAI Emico, SUNG Tzwei, YAMAMOTO Umi
tel: +81 3 5689 1014
fax: +81 3 5689 1044
E-mail: international@nikkatsu.co.jp
https://intl.nikkatsu.com