Cold Fish (5 Stars)

I've lived a normal life. I've never met a serial killer, or at least I've never met a killer who's admitted to being one. I expect the same is true of all my readers. Spending time with a purely evil person is something I wouldn't wish upon anybody. Can evil and madness be contagious, passed on from one person to another? I don't know. I'd like to think that I'm immune to influences like that, but I'm also glad that I've never been put to the test.

Shamoto leads a very ordinary life; ordinary, though not without problems. He owns a small shop that sells tropical fish. After the death of his first wife he's married again. His new wife is young and beautiful, but she's an awful cook. All she can do is put packaged food in the microwave. It's enough for him because he loves her. The biggest problem is his teenage daughter, who's rebellious and despises her new stepmother.

Then Shamoto meets Murata, and everything changes. Murata boasts that he's killed 58 people and will never be caught. Murata expects Shamoto to become his accessory in his future crimes. Shamoto despises Murata, but he's too weak to resist. The question is whether Shamoto will become the person he hates.

This isn't an easy film to watch. It contains more gore than any of Sion Sono's other films. It also contains more madness and depravity. This is appropriate within the context of the film. Shamoto is yanked out of his normal life into a world of killers and madmen. Can he survive without losing his soul? The religious formulation of this question is deliberate. Murders are committed in a small mountaintop shack that's filled with images of Christ and the Virgin Mary.

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