Too many fans seem to be blown away

Just perfect...

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Tales of Betrayal within Yakuza clans .. A message of Status and Position are more important than Loyalty .. "Times have changed for old gangsters"--- M A J O R S P O I L E R S --- The Ikemoto clan and the Murase clan have been doing business behind the Head Chairman's back . He wants in on the profits . To please his Boss , Ikemoto asks Omoto (Kitano) to set up a business in Murase turf to keep an eye on him . Subordinates of Omoto and Murase clans start beefing over "respect" and it leads to casualties on both sides ..The Head Chairman promises positions of power within the Clan if they were to "clean up their mess" . Orders from the Top call to eliminate Murase, Ikemoto, and Omoto under false pretenses the avenger will become the new Clan Leader . The question on every bosses mind is Who can you Trust

I really wonder why there isn't more modern day realistic Yakuza films coming out of Japan. Perhaps it has something to do with the real Yakuza not being too pleased about that idea. I've read a few stories, and that's a strong possibility. Regardless, this film gives me something that i'd like to see more of. (And luckily we did with the sequel to this film being released recently)Takeshi Kitano directs, writes, edits and stars in this film, which is quite impressive. I must say, he does a good job at all of these things. He creates a film that really feels like a look into the violent and backstabbing world of the Yakuza. It doesn't pull any punches, that's for sure. It also contains a scene that will make you fear the dentists office more than you may already fear it. Apparently Kitano wrote the death scenes first, and then wrote the story around it, which you may think would make for a terrible movie, but you would be wrong. The story is intriguing and full of betrayal. The movie also has a great soundtrack that has a very cool synth sound.The performances are all quite believable. In the way that you feel like the actors in Goodfellas are real members of the mafia, Outrage contains actors whose performances would almost have you believe they we're real Yakuza. You have some real despicable characters, and the actors fill those rolls so well.Overall, this is a film that is quite underrated when it comes to the gangster film genre. I would love to see more Yakuza films that have a similar style to this. Highly recommended to gangster movie fans.

This film is about warring clans within a larger yakuza community. Mr. Chairman is the current overall leader; Ikemoto is one of his vassals. Ikemoto, however, has started an alliance with the Murase family, which deals drugs. Mr. Chairman is old school, and does not like trading in drugs. The protagonist, Otomo, is a vassal of Ikemoto, but is a sworn brother of Murase. Mr. Chairman charges Otomo with breaking this alliance by moving against Murase. Otomo is reminded rather strongly that his loyalty to Mr. Chairman should outweigh his brotherhood to Murase.In the meantime, Detective Kataoka of the Organized Crime Unit keeps getting paid off by Otomo. Kataoka gives Otomo intelligence that keeps the police off Otomo's back.Otomo sends an underling to let one of Murase's lieutenants cheat him out of 1 million yen. When the lieutenant arrives at Otomo offices, he sees that the Otomo group is vassal to the Ikemoto family, and begs to skip receiving the payment. Otomo's people insist. Word gets back to Murase, who phones Otomo immediately. Otomo accepts money and a finger and an apology from Murase's under boss, Kimura. The Ikemotos demand a finger from the under boss for the insult.As one might imagine, there was a lot of hurt pride. That, coupled with mistakes by underlings, ignites an escalating set of reprisals. Alliances shift. Ikemoto wants to keep the skim of the drug money, for instance, despite all the thunder coming down from Mr. Chairman.Otomo tries to keep his standing with Mr. Chairman sound, but it is not easy; nor is keeping his sworn brotherhood with Murase. Mr. Chairman makes it worse by demanding reprisals.-----Scores-----Cinematography: 10/10 Beautifully shot using excellent equipment.Sound: 7/10 Moot; I read the subtitles. The background music was good, and the actors seemed to be well miked.Acting: 8/10 All the actors were rather good. Gladly, the ones with the most screen time were the best.Screenplay: 7/10 As a move-forward all-the-time action film, this was great. However, I could have used a bit more exposition of motivation. The film made more sense the second time I watched it, but was still a little unclear.

Sanno-Kai is a powerful yakuza organization with a hierarchical structure of several mutually subordinate clans. Head of Organization, Sekiuchi (Soichiro Kitamura), is dissatisfied with the closeness of his assistant chief Ikemoto (Jun Kunimura) with rival clan of Murase (Renji Ishibashi). Since Ikemoto's clan made a brotherly agreement with Murase's clan, he engages Otomo (Takeshi Kitano) to create a conflict that will eliminate doubts of Sekuichi. Otomo is the head of the family subordinated to Ikemoto, but delegated task to rough Murase gang members up a bit takes over-zealously. This act will ignite bloody spiral of inevitable revenge, sadistic violence and dirty power struggle between the clans, with the head of the organization in the heart of the conflict...The versatile Japanese director Takeshi Kitano has built a worldwide reputation in the nineties recording impressive auteur films about the yakuzas. After he shot the film Brother (2000), he left the genre inspired by the Japanese underworld, and devoted himself to film work on a series of art-drama, exploring the theme of intimate and spiritual significance. With movie Outrage (Autoreiji, 2010) he has closed the full circle of different genre preoccupations and returned to the territory of yakuza clan films. But loyal Kitano audience is likely to be disappointed by the realization of the director's return to the genre: the title of the new film is also its program. Outrage is reduced to the naked and brutal retaliatory clashes and struggle for power and the corresponding territory.Recognizable stylistic origins of earlier Kitano's genre works are in Outrage almost entirely abandoned. In this movie we do not come across the hardened criminals with a humanistic line, ready to dispose of weapons and far away from everyday underground enjoy relaxation in the infantile pastime. World of meditative yakuza characters filled with elegiac lyric is replaced in Outrage with world of one-dimensional techno-gangsters filled with blood of unstoppable brutality. Slow poetics of existential doubt is substituted with the stereotypical characteristic of gangster genre - ruthless struggle for power and money.The narrative of Outrage is told through the tangled web of secret treaties, broken promises, betrayed loyalties, conspiratorial intrigue, fierce revenge and blatant treason, and is constantly escalating in brutal skirmishes. Compliance with the order and hierarchy is nothing but a mere illusion, practice of cutting fingers has lost the value of ritual apology and the only thing left is the cyclical violence in which each execution surpasses the previous. Moreover, the motif of constant violence is repeated until it reaches the final boundaries of the absurd. In an effort that the routine of execution do not become boringly monotone, movie visual aesthetic of violence is presented in an extremely juicy graphics and the borders of creativity are examined in the methods of many executions. Painful cries resound from the use of handguns, crowbars, scalpels, dental drills and innovative combination of rope and luxury sedan. The only element that saves the movie from its classification in the exploitation genre is the intelligent use of black humor, to the extent that the movie is at times transformed into a comic farce, and even unintentional slapstick, especially when the character of African diplomat is in the focus.Takeshi Kitano has returned to the genre of yakuza movies after ten years but without any artistic pretensions. Outrage is a dynamic movie showing successive executions sometimes garnished with black humor, which can provide greater commercial success, but also bring disappointment to many of director fans. New Kitano movie is one-adrenaline entertainment and nothing more, unfortunately.