Retribution

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Sakebi (Retribution)

February 2nd 2010 05:27

Retribution (2006) is a J-Horror ghost tale that melds with a police crime story, written and directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, who made the original Kairo (Pulse, 2001). The literal English translation of the original title, Sakebi, means “shriek” or “the scream”, yet it is known as Dark Crimes (Argentina), The Ghost That Never Forgets (Peru), I Punish (Italy), and Victim of an Hallucination (Brazil). It’s international title is Retribution, which holds dear to its central theme.

Noboru Yoshioka (Kôji Yakusho) is a police detective based in Tokyo. He has a beautiful girlfriend, Harue (Manami Konishi), yet both have a very detached relationship (I actually thought she was a call-girl from the way they interacted). Yoshioka is investigating a murder, a woman in a red dress found head down in a small pool of saltwater on a disused landfill. He finds a button in another puddle nearby. Another murder has similar circumstances, a young man found head down in a container full of saltwater, also on the landfill. No leads, no substantial clues, but Yoshioka feels they are connected by more than just the elements.

Stranger still, Yoshioka feels he is being viewed as a potential suspect, since he owns a trenchcoat missing the same button, and he owns yellow cord like that which was used to strangle the young man. Creeping him out even further the detective starts having visions of the woman in the red dress. She is haunting him, but he doesn’t recognize her, he doesn’t understand her spectre’s motive. Who killed her? What is his connection? Even Yoshioka’s partner doesn’t have anything much to offer. They interrogate a man who confesses to murdering the woman in red, so why won’t the ghost leave Yoshioka alone?!

Retribution Koji Yakusho and Manami Konishi

Retribution is not for easy intellectual consumption, it’s one of the stranger, more complex tales of the supernatural I’ve seen. This is a ghost story that plays mercilessly on memory, identity, and guilt, and vengeance. For Yoshioka his past has come back to haunt him something wicked. But he’s none the wiser for the most part of the movie (and neither is the audience). Retribution has a bizarre end (and an even more bizarre alternate ending, which features in the DVD’s extras). It is at movie’s end that the real truth behind the original title is illustrated. I was right about one thing, a character whom I believed was more important to the narrative than what they appeared to be.

Director Kurosawa (no relation to the great Akira Kurosawa) infuses his story with a languid pace, but there’s briskness present too, no scenes feel extraneous or superfluous in any way. It’s intelligently directed with a solid visual sense, and some excellent special effects, including a man doing a very convincing jump off a three-storey building onto the ground, and some classic ghost behaviour. I was reminded of Ringu’s Sadako by the woman in red (identified first by police as F18, then later as Reiko) with her floating, vividly etched presence.

Retribution plays out like a puzzle, and puzzles by nature never piece together easily. I’m not entirely sure I understand what is going on with Yoshioka and the confrontation of his past, but for certain he makes some terrible realisations. The mind is a fragile creature, and trauma does strange things to memory, identity, and desire. A broken mind is a like a broken mirror; multiple reflections, shards of oneself. Kurosawa uses mirrors, open doorways in the background, and curtains to keep the viewer on edge. Yoshioka is a broken man slowly falling to bits, whilst the woman in red is a disquieting shell determined on bringing down those who abandoned her in her time of need. “I died, so everyone else should die too …” But has she forgiven Yoshioka for one crime, but not another …?

Solid performances and score cement Retribution as a top notch ghost story. Prepare to have your intellect tickled, your sensibilities teased, your nerves jangled mildly. I must make a point of watching some of Kurasawa’s earlier movies, in particular Pulse, Charisma, and Loft. I’m very surprised Hollywood hasn’t secured the rights for a remake to Retribution … Perhaps they have.

Here's the Japanese trailer:

Here's an excellent German trailer:

Retribution DVD is courtesy of Madman Entertainment, many thanks!

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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