Based on director Gu Su-yeon’s semi-autobiographical novel, Hard Romanticker is a spectacularly violent gangster movie that delivers its story with equal amounts of style and carnage. Dripping James Dean-like cool, bleach blond Gu (Shota Matsuda) is a young, cocky Korean-Japanese hoodlum living in Japan. When someone “accidentally” kills the grandmother of a ruthless rival thug, Gu soon finds himself on the receiving end as he becomes the target for bloody, even deadly, revenge. And it doesn’t help that the police are on his tail as well. What’s a snarly, cigarette-puffing thug to do? With tons of ultra-violence, rampaging youths and nihilistic retribution, Hard Romanticker is a sort of a modern-day A Clockwork Orange — yakuza style!

2011 / 109 minutes / Japan / Japanese w/ English subtitles

Director: Su-yeon Gu
Running time: 108 minutes
Country: Japan
Language: Japanese
Screenwriters: Su-yeon Gu, Mitsunori Gu
Cast: Shôta Matsuda, Kento Nagayama, Atsurô Watabe, Tokio Emoto, Sei Ashina, Shidô Nakamura, Keiko Awaji, Kaname Endô, Yûya Endô, Hakuryu, Yûma Ishigaki, Nobuaki Kaneko, Naoki Kawano, Claude Maki, Yôko Maki, Motoki Ochiai, Gôta Watabe, Dai Watanabe
Producer: Masahiro Harada, Kimio Kataoka
Cinematography: Hideyuki Mushû