Read more about Ichi the Killer at: Wikipedia Official Site: Shogakukan is a 2001 Japanese film directed by Takashi Miike, based on Hideo Yamamoto's manga series of the same name. Despite the protestations of Kaneko (Hiroyuki Tanada), crime lord Anjo is left alone to enjoy a prostitute. Anjo is brutally murdered but, when an expert cleaning crew run by Jijii (Shinya Tsukamoto) removes any trace of his body, Anjo's gang and the other crime lords assume he and the prostitute fled town with 300 million yen of the gang's money. Only Kakihara (Tadanobu Asano), Anjo's sadomasochistic enforcer, believes Anjo is still alive. Jijii feeds Kakihara rumors that suggest Suzuki (Susumu Terajima), a member of a rival clan, has kidnapped Anjo. Kakihara captures Suzuki and tortures him by suspending him from a ceiling with metal hooks through the man's back, shoving metal yakitori skewer through his body, and pouring boiling oil on him. Suzuki turns out to be innocent. To make restitution, Kakihara slices off the end of his tongue and offers it to Suzuki's boss (Jun Kunimura). However, Jijii ("grandpa" or "old man") is nowhere to be found. Jijii, it turns out, is secretly orchestrating events in order to pit Yakuza clans against one another. Under Jijii's wing is a young man, Ichi (Nao Omori), who is normally unassuming and cowardly but becomes homicidal when enraged, donning a rubber stuntman suit with razors concealed in the heels of his shoes. Being a confused and apparently psychotic individual who murdered his own parents, Ichi was adopted and manipulated by Jijii to confuse sexual arousal with homicidal lust; this was accomplished by creating a false memory of witnessing a rape in high school, which he felt ashamed for wanting to participate in rather than stop. Other than killing Anjo, Ichi also kills a pimp whom he spied on regularly brutalizing a prostitute named Sailor that Ichi patronizes. When Sailor attacks him, Ichi kills her as well. Later, Ichi helps a boy named Takeshi by kicking a kid bullying him; Takeshi is Kaneko's son. Using Suzuki, Jijii manages to have Kakihara kicked out of the syndicate but the entire Anjo gang defects with him. When he learns that Anjo was killed by Ichi, Kakihara kidnaps and tortures Kano, a former member of the Anyo gang who is helping Jijii. He becomes fascinated with Ichi, seeing him as his last hope to finally find the ultimate pain he has been seeking—one which neither his prostitute girlfriend Karen (Alien Sun) nor his deceased boss could give him. Jijii sends Ichi to slaughter the bulk of Kakihara's men. Upon surveying the carnage, most the survivors abandon Kakihara. Only Kaneko and Takayama remain loyal. CBUB Match Record:
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