2019 TIFF Movie Review: FIRST LOVE (HATSUKOI) (JAPAN/UK 2019)

First Love Poster
A young boxer and a call girl get caught up in a drug-smuggling scheme over the course of one night in Tokyo.

Director:

Takashi Miike

Writer:

Masa Nakamura

A boxer, Leo who has just lost an important bout saves a kidnapped drug addict on the street end up as crossfire between two drug gangs one Chinese and the other Japanese.  An undercover cop also comes into the picture.  All this is an excuse for lots of gore and blood letting violence found in a typical Yakashi Miike (13 ASSASSINS, ICHI THE KILLER) movie.  

The jokes are fierce and plentiful and totally irrelevant.  For example, during a shoot out, a thug suddenly stops running screaming: “I got a leg cramp!” or during a boxing match, a big knockout punch sees the opponent’s head rolling into the street.

The whole exercise is totally silly, loud, annoying and unless one is a Miike fan – like the guy sitting beside me laughing his head off, non-stop – the entire film is a waste of time. 

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XBBGjUf63E