In short: The Guard From Underground (1992)

I don't think art expert Akiko Narushima (Makiko Kuno) has pictured her new job in an only slightly older department of a Japanese firm this way: her boss Kurume (Ren Osugi, once more supporting my theory that he is in every single Japanese movie made in the last twenty years) is a leering creep and ineffective sexual harasser, the rest of her colleagues has not the slightest clue about art (which could be a problem in the art trade, I think), the Human Resources manager Hyodo (Hatsunori Hasegawa) is by turns weird and asleep. But the brand new security guard Fujimaru (Yutaka Matsushige) soon turns out to be even more strange than everyone else. At first, the giant only kills people his colleague in the security office has problems with, but he soon develops a slight fixation on Akiko and a very strong dislike for everyone else.

One night, he and his trusty iron pole begin to lower their employer's overtime costs.

The Guard From Underground is part of the early phase of its director's Kiyoshi Kurosawa's career. As such it is quite different from, although not a lot more commercial than, his later works. We can already see the beginning of the framing techniques that became so important for Kurosawa's films later on, as well as his interest in/obsession with alienation in modern (Japanese) society and the life of incurably sad people. The plot may belong to much more of a thriller than we are used to in Kurosawa films, yet the way the film is told seems quite disinterested in it being thrilling.

Much of the film is carried by the strange, surrealist (or is it just non-realist?) kind of humor you may remember from Doppelganger or even Charisma, while never really leading into the disturbing or near-incomprehensible areas those films touched. That of course is Guard's problem - it is already too far away from the standard horror film its script wants it to be and has at the same time not arrived at the crossing of genre and art house its director's later films inhabit better than just anybody else's.

Still, Guard is a kind of treasure trove for Kurosawa nerds like me, as long as one doesn't expect it to be a masterpiece or a very effective thriller.

 

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