n the present-day steel-and-girder colossus of Tokyo, Tomoo Taniguchi
is an unassuming businessman providing for his wife and son. Their
humble lives are shattered one day when the son is kidnapped. Tomoo
bursts into a rage as he pursues the attackers, and his body morphs into
extensions of his fury, his hands becoming massive guns. Nevertheless, the kidnappers escape.
Tomoo and his wife have little time to mourn, however, as Tomoo himself is kidnapped and subjected to weird, torturous psychological and biomechanical experiments. Tomoo's torturer appears to be the leader of a violent cabal of techno-warriors who have been altered by the same experiments that Tomoo now endures. The shadowy torturer also seems to know Tomoo intimately, and his past as well. This is a past to which Tomoo himself is a stranger: adopted at age eight, he has no clear memories of his early childhood.
The leader gives the order to terminate Tomoo, but in his rage Tomoo transforms into a murderous, uncontrollable cyborg and frees himself from his captors. He escapes and returns to his wife, who is afraid of what Tomoo has become. Meek before, Tomoo's rage has made him omnipotent, but inhuman. Seeing that Tomoo cannot be controlled through sheer force, the cabal kidnaps his wife. Tomoo's rage is awesome, and where before mini-cannons exploded from his chest and his arms transformed into machine guns, now his entire body is a tank, a rolling, steel tower of violence and revenge. And revenge has meaning. The mysterious stranger is none other than Tomoo's long-lost brother...
Good, but a step below great
Tetsuo II: Body Hammer is an entry in the
subgenre of live-action anime. This translates as using real actors, but also
special effects and animation, to deliver image-rich, abstract and
stylized action. As with most anime, Tetsuo II's plot is
more conceptual than linear, relying heavily on archetype and metaphor.
One of the film's most prominently-used symbols is that of Tokyo's icy,
high-gloss skyscrapers, a symbol that director Shinya Tsukamoto wields deftly.
Soaring, indifferent, metal architecture is the visual echo of the
cyborg prison that finally encases Tomoo.
Tsukamoto renders the film entirely in cool grays and blues. Everything
within the hegemony of emotion (love, fear, hatred, vengeance) is
isolated and equalized through this color scheme (one exception: a
flashback). This all builds upon the film's themes that: 1) violence can
liberate the self from an oppressive, industrialized society; and 2) the
violence that liberates ironically becomes its own jail.
Although the buzz around Tetsuo II is frenetic (largely
because of the hot-cult status of its predecessor, Tetsuo),
the film is actually only good, not great, and no masterpiece. It
swings uncomfortably between sweeping imagery and dollops of plot, and
would soar higher if it trusted its art-house instincts more.
Additionally, its imagric quality and inventiveness are uneven; there
are a few scenes that are provocative and haunting, but many are
overwrought. Lastly, viewers should take note of its violence, which
makes Tetsuo II inappropriate for sub-adults (especially a
graphic and over-long rape scene). The film finishes as a should-see
for fans of the genre.
