Metropolitan Police Branch 82: Silk and Steel (1998)
5028DVD
original
Japanese title NEW
METROPOLITAN POLICE BRANCH 83: SILK AND STEEL also known as The New Metropolitan
Police Branch 82: Rebirth
also known as MPB82 THE SECOND STORY
This
is officially the third entry in the Metropolitan Police Branch 82
series, preceded by Chusei Sone's SUPER
GUN LADY (1979), based on Tőru Shinohara's manga series
starring Emi Yokoyama and Kaoru Jumbo as detectives Mika and Rin. The
sequel came 20 years later, with Chieko Shitaturi and Tomomi Kuribayashi
playing Mika and Rin [Lin] in METROPOLITAN
POLICE BRANCH 82(1998), arguably the best reincarnation of these
characters. A third entry MPB 82: REBIRTH (aka SILK AND STEEL)
came to the screen later that year, this time with the less impressive
Yumiko Hara and Miyuki Iijima in pivotal roles. The two detectives go
undercover as dancers at a strip-club, looking for clues leading to information
in a sex trafficking case. Unlike the previous film, this one suffers
from a severe lack of character development. Instead, Mika and Lin trade-off
bawdy one-liners without any attempt to match the comments to their characters,
In fact, the relationship is so lackluster, it's difficult to distinguish
one girl from the other. A more perplexing problem is - after the first
few minutes of lingering with naked bodies in the strip club - director
Masahide Kuwabara becomes completely obsessed with his lightweight action
agenda [i.e., the story of Lin (or is it Mika?) getting
kidnapped and brainwashed by an evil gang] that the movie simply stops
being sexy at about 30 minutes in..
Masahide Kuwabara
would vacate the director's seat after this film, becoming an assistant
director to legendary Shôhei Imamura during the last years of the
masters life.
A Japanese
film with English subtitles; widescreen format,
uncut print 92 minutes, DVD Package encoded for ALL REGION NTSC FORMAT.
Extras include
original trailers.
Violence/Nudity/Sexual
Situations/Rape/Drugs
Recommended for Mature Audiences
