The Most Terrible Time in My Life
Detective Maiku 'Mike' Hama (Masatoshi Nagase; MYSTERY TRAIN)
navigates the Yokohama underworld with razor sharp threads, Belmondo cool and
two-fisted street savvy. But when he comes to the aid of a Taiwanese waiter at a
local mah-jongg parlor, the unflappable Hama has no idea what he's in for.
Though seemingly a luckless immigrant teetering on the threshold of Yokohama's
gutter, Hama's Taiwanese client holds the secret to a ferocious gangland revenge
triangle that soon has bullets, fists and severed fingers flying. Hama's plunge
into a dizzyingly escalating, brutally violent multiethnic gang war ultimately
snares him in a web of revenge and deceit that spans continents and severs
bloodlines.
Things aren't what they seem in director Kaizo Hayashi's glorious black and
white widescreen valentine to French New Wave, American Film Noir and Japanese
gangster flicks. Though a hard-boiled P.I. in the Spillane mold, Hama is really
all heart and as likely to trip over his kid sister's apron strings as trip up a
two-faced gangster. Once he's out of his movie theater office and on the case,
Hama becomes a punching bag for everyone from corrupt cops to Yakuza thugs and
even his detective mentor (Seijun Suzuki regular Shishido Jo).
Though THE MOST TERRIBLE TIME IN MY LIFE begins as a meticulous and sly
parody of all things Noir, it is 'at heart a work of infectious, unironic
affection.' (Village Voice). Hayashi's shadowy retro gloss and self-made
hero decorate a very real portrait of shifting allegiances in a modern Japan of
ebbing compassion and a modern Asia with vanishing borders.
- NTSC Region 1
- Widescreen
- Theatrical Trailer
- Trailer Gallery
- Stills Gallery
- Optional English Subtitles
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