Cover Story: Bright Future

Japanese director Kiyoshi Kurosawa (no relation to Akira) has built a reputation on either side of the Pacific for his ruthless, surgical precision in such horror films as Cure and Pulse. Bright Future sets a similarly unnerving tone in an enigmatic tale that defies genre classification.

Two disgruntled warehouse workers maintain a strange, almost parasitical relationship. Arita (Tadanobu Asano), the alpha member of the pair, makes the decisions and obsesses over his poisonous pet jellyfish. Passive Nimura (J Odagiri) follows Arita's lead and describes haunting dreams of a lovely future that contrasts with his grubby, dead-end present. When Arita commits a ghastly crime without apparent motive, Nimura's already shaky grasp on reality begins to slip.

Bright Future plays less like a straight-up noir thriller and more like an existential puzzle akin to Albert Camus' The Stranger. Arita's lack of regard for human life parallels such notorious sociopaths as Leopold and Loeb. Through Nimura's eyes, urban life and careerism appear utterly meaningless, and authority figures, like their emotionally needy boss, prove unworthy of respect. We alternate between admiration and pity for Arita's lonely father (Tatsuya Fuji) and his dedication to the "dying" profession of repairing small electronics.

When Arita's deadly jellyfish escapes into the Tokyo water supply, it emerges as an intriguingly loaded metaphor. As enthralling as a million-dollar special effect, the delicate, luminous creature represents nature's ability to adapt but underscores how lethal beauty can be. Just as the jellyfish symbolizes life and death in one organism, so does Nimura vacillate between a nihilistic path and a more positive one. But Nimura ultimately makes too many changes of heart, muddying Kurosawa's intentions.

The film cultivates an effective sense of unease, and Kurosawa's actors give suitably subtle performances as restless, emotionally disconnected souls. Yet Bright Future both frustrates and fascinates with its refusal to give pat answers. The film frequently presents images that hint at society's slow, ominous transformations: One sequence shows restless juvenile delinquents wearing flashing headphones that make them look like androids. Or maybe jellyfish.

Bright Future screens June 13 at 5 p.m., Landmark Midtown Art Cinema.