Director Kensuke Sonomura’s follow-up to his impressive Bad City, Ghost Killer is John Wick meets Patrick Swayze’s Ghost playing at Fantastic Fest 2024!
Action director Kensuke Sonomura has given the Baby Assassins series its speedy impactful fight choreography. His debut feature film, Bad City, affirmed that beyond a great choreographer who can reveal character and story in a fight scene, he could deliver a truly great film. Ghost Killer his follow-up to Bad City finds Sonomura delivering another great film this time a high-concept action thriller.
A hitman Kudo (Masanori Mimoto) is killed by his employers. All of his rage and want for vengeance ends up in the bullet shell casing that ended his life. That shell ends up in the hands of Fumika (Akari Takaishi). The well-meaning student becomes tied to Kudo because of their shared rage for injustice (his for his murder, her for the way men treat women). Together they must work together, even if they hate each other, to avenge Kudo’s murder. No matter how many bodies, much to Fumika’s resistance, pile up.
This clever play on the hitman genre was written by Baby Assassins director/screenwriter Yugo Sakamoto with the same sort of clever youth-in-revolt style that he brought to that comedic action series. In fact, having both Mimoto and Takaishi from the series only doubles down on the creative and playful nature of the piece. The body possession aspect works so well because the duo has worked with Sonomura for years. There isn’t a moment that the duo shares on screen or where the Kudo character inhabits Fumika’s body that doesn’t feel perfect.
Akari Takaishi has become quite the nimble comedic and action performer since the first Baby Assassins film. Ghost Killer feels like a leap forward as an actor. There’s a balance here between the two characters that she nails that few if any could possibly do. There aren’t hero grandstanding or overtly cowardly moments but a subtly to the performance that one appreciates more and more as the film builds to its climatic battle. The same can be said for Masanori Mimoto who’s ghost hitman who alternates from Zen calm killer to comedic bafflement at the young woman he’s been linked to.
Ghost Killer has the perfect balance of action and comedy that made the Baby Assassins films so wonderful. Director Sonomura continues to acquit himself as one of the truly great action film directors in the world.
Director Kensuke Sonomura’s follow-up to his impressive Bad City, Ghost Killer is John Wick meets Patrick Swayze’s Ghost playing at Fantastic Fest 2024!
Action director Kensuke Sonomura has given the Baby Assassins series its speedy impactful fight choreography. His debut feature film, Bad City, affirmed that beyond a great choreographer who can reveal character and story in a fight scene, he could deliver a truly great film. Ghost Killer his follow-up to Bad City finds Sonomura delivering another great film this time a high-concept action thriller.
A hitman Kudo (Masanori Mimoto) is killed by his employers. All of his rage and want for vengeance ends up in the bullet shell casing that ended his life. That shell ends up in the hands of Fumika (Akari Takaishi). The well-meaning student becomes tied to Kudo because of their shared rage for injustice (his for his murder, her for the way men treat women). Together they must work together, even if they hate each other, to avenge Kudo’s murder. No matter how many bodies, much to Fumika’s resistance, pile up.
This clever play on the hitman genre was written by Baby Assassins director/screenwriter Yugo Sakamoto with the same sort of clever youth-in-revolt style that he brought to that comedic action series. In fact, having both Mimoto and Takaishi from the series only doubles down on the creative and playful nature of the piece. The body possession aspect works so well because the duo has worked with Sonomura for years. There isn’t a moment that the duo shares on screen or where the Kudo character inhabits Fumika’s body that doesn’t feel perfect.
Akari Takaishi has become quite the nimble comedic and action performer since the first Baby Assassins film. Ghost Killer feels like a leap forward as an actor. There’s a balance here between the two characters that she nails that few if any could possibly do. There aren’t hero grandstanding or overtly cowardly moments but a subtly to the performance that one appreciates more and more as the film builds to its climatic battle. The same can be said for Masanori Mimoto who’s ghost hitman who alternates from Zen calm killer to comedic bafflement at the young woman he’s been linked to.
Ghost Killer has the perfect balance of action and comedy that made the Baby Assassins films so wonderful. Director Sonomura continues to acquit himself as one of the truly great action film directors in the world.
Ghost Killer played at Fantastic Fest on September 19th and plays again September 25th
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