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Brother

Threat advisory: Elevated - Significant risk of entertaining activities

Movie propaganda

The one guy you trust to get your back when a whole city's trying to put a bullet in it.

Yamamoto (Beat Takeshi) is now a lone Yakuza officer. Defeated in a war with a rival family, his boss killed and most entrusted "brother" (Yakuza associate) abandoning him, only the whereabouts of his younger brother, Ken (Claude Maki), who disappeared after leaving Japan to study in Los Angeles, matter to him at all. Yamamoto's search for Ken in LA begins...

On the day Yamamoto arrives in LA, he is confronted by an African-American named Denny (Omar Epps). Denny tries to rip Yamamoto off as they pass by each another on a street but is left having his one of his eyes injured by Yamamoto's swift move. Irritated from the fact that his younger brother cannot be found and wandering into a foreign culture where he does not speak the language, the act may have been triggered by no other than Yamamoto's acute instinct of self-defence.

Following some clues, Yamamoto finally tracks Ken down. The younger brother had fallen into a drug pusher. He also discovers that Denny, the very man who Yamamoto wounded, and Ken, are friends. With Yamamoto appearing suddenly and staying at Ken's apartment, a strange communal life begins, through which a tight friendship begins to grow between the two.

As time passes, Yamamoto and his gang emerge as a powerful force, gradually expanding their turf to an extent that they must confront the Mafia. The Mafia's attacks are ruthless and soon Yamamoto and his gang are driven into a disastrous situation of no return...

Persons of interest

Takeshi "Beat" Kitano .... Aniki Yamamoto
Omar Epps .... Denny
Kuroudo Maki .... Ken
Masaya Kato .... Shirase
Susumu Terajima .... Kato
Royale Watkins .... Jay
Lombardo Boyar .... Mo
Ren Osugi .... Harada
Ryo Ishibashi .... Ishihara
James Shigeta .... Sugimoto
Tatyana Ali .... Latifa
Makoto Otake .... Chief of Police
Kouen Okumura .... Hanaoka
Naomasa Musaka .... Hisamatsu
Takeshi "Beat" Kitano .... Screenwriter
Takeshi "Beat" Kitano .... Director

Cinematic intelligence sources

Brother official movie sites
Awards and film festivals:

Deauville Festival of American Film Film Festival: Première
Venice Film Festival: World première

Not to be confused with Gary Hardwick's The brothers

Intelligence analyst

Special Agent Matti

Theatrical report

Back off Luigi, the Yakuza are here.

In an orgy of violence that makes Rush hour 2 look like The revenge of Bambi, Brother takes the eastern mores of family and unstinting honour and thrusts them into an unsuspecting Los Angeles. Sure, California is used to the Mafia, the triads (see Romeo must die) and the homeboys, but nothing beats the Japanese for efficiency when it comes to murder, drug distribution, prostitution and stand-over tactics. And they make it smaller.

Beat is the stony-faced criminal of honour who has to find a new life for himself and he plays it to a T (what does that bloody well mean, anyway?). He has done it before in Kikujiro but that is a whole different kettle of sushi. Then, he was just a guy, now, he's a samurai with an urge to have someone's guts for garters.

The violence in Brother, while entirely justified, definitely deserves the top end rating given to it by the Office of Film and Literature Classification. Even I was squirming all over the furniture at some of it and that's a real incentive to see it for some of you. You won't be disappointed. What might get your goat is the occasional moment of Zen minimalism, when it appears that nothing is happening on the screen. If that's what you think is going on, you need to do more ikibana. Ask your Sensei.