User reviews

I saw this film on crappy pan and scan VHS when I was about 12 and I didn't really understand it and I wasn't really up on Ridley Scott's work. As a result, the impact of the film was somewhat lost on me. I was expecting an action film instead of a character drama with lots of police procedure. But now, older and wiser and with a brand new Blu Ray of the movie, I am finally able to appreciate how clever the film is.

The story unfortunately IS riddled with 80s Cop Movie clichés and goes through quite a lot of familiar motions. But if you see past that you'll appreciate the immense atmosphere and mood that Ridley Scott piles on. Simply put, Michael Douglas is Nick Conklin, a bad cop (pretty much the exact same character in Basic Instinct) who drag races on his superbike to pay alimony and pinches drug money instead of turning it in for evidence. Enjoying lunch with partner Charlie (Andy Garcia) in a steakhouse in New York's meat-packing district, they just happen to witness a Yakuza execution by wanted Japanese criminal Sato (Yusaku Matsuda, who was dying of cancer during filming and didn't tell anyone). After a quick punch-up and shoot-out they find themselves chaperoning Sato back to Osaka. But when they arrive there he manages to escape, leaving them embarrassed with lots of questions to answer.

Nick and Charlie find themselves in a very foreign and intolerant world and recapturing Sato proves to be difficult in many ways. Not the least of which is Japan's alienating culture (from an NYPD point of view) and rigid rules. Nonetheless, Nick is determined to catch Sato and restore his honor.

Like I said, the atmosphere of the film is overwhelming, which is really all the film needs. The clichés and stereotypes don't matter so much when you are involved this much. Hans Zimmer (his first film with Ridley Scott) provides a deeply emotional and very melodic score that'll be rattling around in your head for days. It's a shame it's never had a comprehensive CD release, as it's one of Zimmer's most impressive efforts.

You could call it a pretty 80s movies, but I still do feel that it holds up pretty well today. As one of Ridley Scott's more forgotten works, it's well worth checking out.

This solid thriller deals with a down-home cop (Michael Douglas) accused of corruption and his young partner (Andy Garcia). They witness a grisly killing by a Japonese murderer named Sato (Matsuda). They pursuit him and barely escape with their life , but get detain him . They're assigned to protect him but with painful results when the mobster is transported to Osaka . Then they are assigned to upright Inspector (Ken Takatura) and forced into action against Yakuza . Thus starts a clash of culture and a cobweb of intrigue which keep the spectators on the edge of their seats. An American Cop in Japan. Their country. Their laws. Their game. His rules. Osaka, Japan. A cop on the edge. A conspiracy on the rise. A killer on the loose. A cop on the edge, a conspiracy in the rise, a killer on the loose.

A Ridley Scott Film From The Producers of "Fatal Attraction", this is a superb, though predictable at times, blending of tough American police genre and Japanese gangsters by means of a mobster organization called Yakuza, a kind of oriental Mafia . Michael Douglas as down-and-out police and Ken Takatura as honorable Inspector are very fine . Good secondary actors , such as : Andy Garcia and Kate Capshaw , Spileberg's wife . Appearing uncredited John Spencer as the chief official and Luis Guzman . This first-rate suspenseful action pic benefits from intelligent screenplay and visual dynamics ; however, being overlong , two hours and some. This special buddy-movie is full of neon lights from Osaka in videoclip and advertisement spots style . The motion picture was glamorously directed by Ridley Scott as stylish as ever , similar his previous film (Someone to watch over me) and others (Blade runner , Duelists , Legend) in which the visual style is impressive .

Douglas, as a tough american detective and his partner played superbly by Andy Garcia chase down a murder suspect on his home turf- Tokyo An excellent movie that explores the culture shock felt by Douglas on his chase and the bureaucracy that tries to stop him..this violent tension filled film is not for the young ones but provides loads of action from the director of Blade Runner.. on a scale of one to ten... a 7

I have never been able to warm up to BLACK RAIN, a cliché-ridden 80s cop thriller. Michael Douglas, who by 1989 was a big Hollywood star with a mullet, plays a crooked cop who escorts a Yakuza home to Japan after witnessing the guy kill two people. His partner Andy Garcia is along for the ride. As soon as they touch down in Tokyo, they lose the killer and the chase is on. Soon enough, they are teamed up with a by-the-book Japanese detective, played by the doleful Ken Takakura. The problem with the movie is, it is shot MTV-style and we are all over the place with this one, rarely sitting still long enough to catch our collective breath. You'd think Tony, not Ridley, shot this one. Douglas is fine and basically carries the movie, and Garcia is believable as a naive, fresh-faced youngster who lacks Douglas' street smarts. The bad guys are stock characters and just not that interesting. In the end, too much chasing around without much of a payoff will have worn most viewers out long before the final scene.

Two American Detectives arrest a member of The Yakuza, and arrange to transport him back to Tokyo. When they arrive in Tokyo, they are outsmarted, and the criminal is sprung, they stay in Japan to bring him to justice.

When you read exactly what is in the mix, Ridley Scott, Michael Douglas, Andy Garcia, Oscar nominations, even the great Hans Zimmer providing the music, you'd think you were in for a classic, and I'd argue that's exactly what Black Rain is.

Ridley Scott is known for delivering hard hitting, bleak epics, and Black Rain is no exception, don't expect many lighter moments, they are few and far between, do expect action, grit, pace and a great story.

The clash of cultures makes it a very interesting watch, we have the brash, gung ho Americans up against the cultured and methodical Japanese.

The cast do a first rate job, I may be somewhat biased, but I'm a huge fan of Michael Douglas, and he's terrific here.

Lots of 1980's glamour, Kate Capshaw looks incredible in almost every scene, Garcia cuts a pretty dashing figure also.

It's a film that has aged pretty well.

9/10.

Micheal Douglas has always been, at least for me, one of the better actors to portray a cop on screen. Very believable, very real, he just has a natural feel for this type of role. I think its due to the fact he starred as one on TV in "The Streets of San Francisco". Everything blends in this cop thriller. It oozes style and panache. It also has an underlying emotional core that I think gets underrated by critics. Douglas as Nick Conklin has some fine moments playing off the characters played by Andy Garcia, Kate Capshaw and especially Ken Takakura. This movie combines excellent acting, gorgeous cinematography, great atmosphere, along with some solid action set pieces...and gets it right. Director Ridley Scott brings all his cinematic guns to bear and spins these elements into a definitive police action thriller. I loved this flick when I saw it in 1989 and I still do. It may not be as audacious as when it premiered, time has seen to that(ex.action scenes have really gone virtual reality)but it's still a respectable addition to your DVD library. And of that fact there is no gray area!

Black Rain is your typical Hollywood movie...shallow. This movie contains so many stereotypes about Japan and the Japanese people it is almost insulting. The audience is led to believe that an American cop with a chip on his shoulder is able to infiltrate the Yakuza, Police system etc.in less than 24 hours. Haven't we seen enough 'America saves the world' type movies? Perhaps the only good thing about this movie is that for a change they actually have Japanese actors playing Japanese people and not an Asian looking face. Save your time and watch Sidney Polack's 'The Yakuza' which at least digs deeper into the Japanese mindset.

Black Rain is an absolutely gorgeous movie to look at. And for the most part it's highly entertaining and well acted - the guy playing Sato is brilliantly menacing. But occasionally, very occasionally, it descends into either complete predictability or downright cheesiness. A motorbike chase, well, that's a surprise! And that award ceremony right near the end - why? It's totally irrelevant, feel good factor nonsense - the sort of stuff you get with bog standard action movies. And this is not bog standard, and not really an action movie. Certainly underrated and deserving of a better audience than it has received, but ultimately let down by a few lapses in quality.

Black Rain may not be one of the best films I've seen from director Ridley Scott or from Michael Douglas. Despite all the work to make it a darker effort than one might see, and more exotic with the Japanese locales, there's still the good-ol' American style to the story of "I always get my man", and it's the main thing that keeps it into the conventional and even 'safe' territory. But where it strikes its best ground, and stays fresh outside of its 80's period (and at this point it's a period piece thanks to the drastic drop in crime in NYC, if not in how the yakuza works in Japan), is in its focus as a character study, as opposed to the action which is more or less to be expected (there's even a ritualistic beheading of a character, of whom I won't reveal).

For Michael Douglas this was an attempt to deepened his persona as a star from what his two huge hits had been two years before (Wall Street and Fatal Attraction). Here he's not in a 'gray' area as a character, he's a fallen soul who curses like a sailor, is even more of a hard-ass than Harry Callahan, and will go to any length to get his man as it continues to go against the Japanese police force. It's a good character for him to play, and he has good back up with Andy Garcia as a fresh-faced young cop and Ken Takakura especially in a subtle part as the Japanese detective who's along for, whether he likes it or not, the long haul of this case against the psycho yakuza Sato (bad-ass Yukatsu Matsuda, sadly his last film). It's such a fascinating batch of characters and actors (hell, even Kate Capshaw gets her due as a noir character) that it's a shame the plot sometimes gets in the way as the yakuza prepare for a counterfeiting scam.

As luck would have it, almost in spite of the limitations of the script, Scott and DP Jan de Bont make the film cool to look at, with that touch of exotic locales and strange presences to scenes that Scott obviously loves, and with that smokey tint that was a trademark of much of the Scott brothers work (Ridley and Tony) up until the mid 90s. It's an atmospheric dip into some hard-edged pot-boiling fun and danger, just as long as you don't think too much about it amounting to a small hill of beans. 7.5/10

Two New York City cops arrest a Yakuza member and must escort him when he is extradited to Japan.

I got this movie on accident. I was looking for "Black Rain", a 1989 Japanese film. Instead I got "Black Rain", a 1989 American film that happens to have Japan as a big part of the plot. Strange, and I am sure I am not the first one to make this mistake. But you really cannot complain when you get to check another Ridley Scott film off your list.

This is a rather strong film for Michael Douglas. Not quite as strong as "Falling Down", but it does have some of his most vulgar and tough dialogue. The line "I usually get kissed before..." has become a small part of the popular culture.

I've heard there's a movie called North (1994) where Elijah Wood travels the world encountering oversimplified and offensive stereotypes. Well, here we have North: Japanese Edition.

I always remember this movie because of its dark and gritty atmosphere. I can't fault it for that. This film is absolutely set in an obscure Tokyo of eternal night lit only by pale neon glows; Douglas eternally sports a black leather jacket and most of the other characters are dressed like industrial goths; even the daytime scenes, of which there are a few, look so cloudy and dirty that it looks like some post-apocalyptic world after the bomb was dropped and created a persistent nucular cloud.

But the film is unintentionally funny in its zeal to cover every single sensationalist stereotype skewed, exaggerated, and exported for foreign consumption. Geishas? Check. Psychopathic yakuza that cut off their pinkies? Check. Motorcycle gangs, Dekotora trucks, samurai swords, traditional martial arts - yeah, you got it.

Douglas' partner in a dashing Andy Garcia at the top of his game even suffers death by ethnic cliche number 22.

Then we have the final master stroke near the end that gives the film its title. You guessed it. As one Japanese character erratically informs us, it turns out that, in a shocking twist, that all of the events of the movie were caused by the butterfly effect stemming from the dropping of the BOMB on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. :O

Inane script and kind of dumb portrayal of the Japanese, but it's got a lot of good points, especially in the ambience, acting, and general artistic direction. At least visually you aren't likely to forget it any time soon.

Honourable Mentions: Black Rain (1989). This movie inappropriately highjacked this name for no reason other than to put a final cherry on top of the stereotype sundae. A Japanese movie with this name (and more appropriately titled, since it was actually about the nucular bombing of Japan) had the unfortunate fate of coming out the same year, so it makes it very difficult to find it in English. RIP Real Black Rain (1989).

This is a stylish if somewhat dated (now) mismatched partner cop flick. The mismatch is not your standard comedy fare, but rather an interesting, if somewhat superficial, examination of the cultural differences between the USA and Japan.

The acting is so so, dialogue ok, and the plot fun. The strength of this movie is the cinematic style that only Scott can bring. He is a master!

Black Rain (1989) Starring Michael Douglas and Andy Garcia.

Running Time: 125 min. Rated R

Black Rain stars Michael Douglas(Wall Street, Falling Down) and Andy Garcia(The Untouchables, Desperate Measures) as Detectives Nick Conklin and Charlie Vincent. One day while eating lunch at a local diner, they witness a horrific mob killing. The twist is that the killer is a dangerous gangster named Sato(Yusaku Matsuda) from Japan who is also wanted their for various other crimes. Soon after, a chase ensues and Sato is captured. The police tell Nick and Charlie that he must be returned to Japan in order to be prosecuted. When they finally get to Japan, the police there are very generous in accepting Sato, only they're not the police, they're Sato's thugs in disguise. So Nick and Charlie must go after him, but because they are foreigners, no one will help them in their investigation and they must also accept a new partner (Ken Takakura).

Filmed on location in Tokyo, Japan, Ridley Scott, who also directed Alien(1979), Blade Runner(1982) and Gladiator(2000) sets up a really dark tone for, much as he does in most of his films.

It's also surprising how low the rating is for this movie. It's a classic like so many other of Scott's films.

10/10

Black Rain is hands down the best cop movie ever made! And I'm not saying that just because I like it. The cinematography and even the costumes were phenomenal and couldn't have been any better. Whoever did the casting for this movie earned their pay and then some. You couldn't have found better actors anywhere in the world. This is Michael Douglas at his best as New York Detective Nick Conklin, a macho yet streetwise cop after a coldblooded Yakuza killer all the way from the back alleys of Manhattan to the streets of Japan. Andy Garcia also gives a tour-de-force performance as Douglas's partner Charley Vincent and gives the movie some extra humor. There some great one liners here. I even like Kate Capshaw as Conklin's friend and love interest. Sato Kogei, the bad guy, is played brilliantly and almost effortlessly by Yusako Matsuda. Why haven't I ever seen this guy in anything else? Definitely one of my top ten best villains to grace the silver screen. Also look for Ken Takakura as Masahiro Matsamodo the stubborn and by the book police officer who befriends Douglas and Garcia and helps them chase Matsuda (Takakura was also in Mr. Baseball). Sato's rival Sugai Kenyo gives a stunningly great performance as well as the old time crime boss. Anyways if you haven't seen this film go out and get it like I did and make it part of your collection. Its great viewing, timeless and worth every penny. You won't regret it.

Let me start to say that Ridley Scott is a great and innovative visual director, his visual compositions are meticulously planned, and then, beautifully designed to the big screen, but unfortunately his handling of the storytelling and the direction to his actors never were as good.

"Black Rain" was made after the critical and box office flop of Scott's previous crime / thriller film, "Someone to Watch Over Me" ('87) that tanked Tom Berenger's career as a leading man in Hollywood, and was partially influenced by Michael Cimino's "Year of the Dragon" ('85) and Walter Hill's "Red Heat" ('88), especially the latter, with improbable partners and cross-cultural clashes within the 'buddy cop' sub-genre that went popular after the box office hit of "48 Hrs." ('82). Throwing in the 'tech-baroque' visuals which tries to emulate Scott's own masterpiece "Blade Runner" ('82), with even the same initials B.R., and the end result was "Black Rain", a tepid cop thriller that owns more to style than to substance.

The screenplay, written by Craig Bolotin & Warren Lewis, is generic and shallow, full of cliché-ridden situations, plot contrivances and devices which only serve the purpose to move the movie along for the over 2 hours mark. There aren't much of surprises or twists and becomes way predictable half the way, if it wasn't for the visual fanfare, the production values (from a $30 million budget) and the A-list cast, it could have been one of those action / cop thrillers, cheaper by the dozen, made every year to limited theather releases or even direct-to-video.

Produced by Stanley R. Jaffe & Sherry Lansing in association with the leading star, Michael Douglas, it was obvious that the movie would be made around his character with total creative control over his performance, character's actions and manneirisms in which Douglas reminds us viewers almost in every frame of the film. Nick Conklin, the roguish, but not that bad NYC police detective, is everywhere chewing the scenery off with his hellraiser attitude, greasy mullet and sweary words, only somewhat controlled by his much younger partner, Charlie Vincent (Andy Garcia, in an early co-leading role after "The Untouchables", but before "The Godfather - Part III" & "Internal Affairs") who overacts in every scene he was in and his fate in the film was predictable since the moment he steps in Osaka and famed Japanese actor, Ken Takakura ("The Yakuza"), enters the plot. Michael Douglas' Conklin is the "bad cop" to Andy Garcia's Vincent "good cop" gimmick (spoofed the very same year by Sylvester Stallone and Kurt Russell in "Tango & Cash" and in lots of action films that came before and after "Black Rain").

Mrs. Spielberg, Kate Capshaw was hired based on her most famous film, "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" ('84), which the opening is set in a Shanghai Nightclub. Her character here (Joyce) shares the same background as Willie Scott, except for the screaming. She's classy, gorgeous, mysterious and surprisingly good in her limited screen time, playing the 'femme fatale' type to the 'neo-noir' tone of the film, without being... fatal at all. In a matter of fact, her badly written character was totally unnecessary, just to give some female vibe to a men's film and for Douglas to have the usual screenkiss.

Kudos to the deceased Japanese actor, Yusaku Matsuda playing the stylish villain, Koji Sato. Matsuda was suffering from bladder cancer, but choose to make the film anyway, dying just weeks after the production wrapped. "Black Rain" is dedicated to his memory.

The cinematography by Jan de Bont ("Flesh+Blood", "Robocop"), before his turning into director ("Speed", "Twister") is astonishingly stylish and classy, setting the noir-ish tone of the film to 'tech-noir', a combination between the old style and the dark modernism of Japan in the 80's, but like in every Ridley Scott's film, it's hard to tell how much the cinematographer really contributes to the film's overall visual style, when in fact it's the (only) expertise of Scott as a filmmaker.

Great orchestration by Hans Zimmer, in his first collaboration with Ridley Scott, being the most famous the acclaimed "Gladiator" where Zimmer was nominated for Best Original Score. The soundtrack also includes "Living on the Edge of the Night", played at the end credits, and "Laser Man" performed by two music icons, respectively, Iggy Pop and Ryuichi Sakamoto.

In short, "Black Rain" is a moderately entertaining 'popcorn' action / thriller, disguised as 'artsy', which divided the fans, as some idolize it as some kind of "Blade Runner" set in the 80's, others find it superficial, overrated and overhyped. It lacks the narrative complexity, the characters' development and even the philosophical side of "Blade Runner", so it's better to be watched as a sophisticated, but generic / 'all look and no heart', B-film. It looks more like a Tony Scott's film ("Top Gun", "Days of Thunder"), Ridley's younger brother, than a film directed by the filmmaker who gave us "Alien" ('79) and "Blade Runner" ('82).

As a footnote, the late great Rutger Hauer (which basically played a similar character in "Wanted Dead or Alive", with mullet included) could have been so much better in the Nick Conklin part, as Ridley envisioned his 'Roy Batty' in the lead role, before Douglas came in as a producer and demanded the lead. Rutger could have enhanced and elevated the charm of "Black Rain" as a solo cult-film, instead of being a hybrid of a mainstream big budget 'wanna-be artsy' production with the fresh Oscar winner superstar Michael Douglas, when its foundations are purely and totally from a B-film.

I rate it a 7.5, with a decrease to 7 in the IMDb rating, due to be extremely over-hyped.

Quite frankly, my main reason to watch Ridley Scott's "Black Rain" was the fact that it features the great Tomisaburo Wakayama in one of his last roles, as a Yakuza Boss. Wakayama is best known for playing Ogami Itto in six "Lone Wolf and Cub" ("Kozure Okami") films, all of which are personal favorites of mine, from 1972 to 1974. Wakayama, who died in 1992 (the film is from 1989), is always a very convincing reason for me to watch a film. Otherwise I did not expect too much. I am not the biggest fan of Michael Douglas, but he was a good choice to the role of the burned-out cop with an anger issue he plays here. Andy Garcia is good as usual, and the film furthermore stars prolific Japanese character actor Ken Takakura, who very good as a Japanes cop. And everybody knows that Ridley "Alien" Scott is a more than capable director. The film is entertaining, and yet I cannot say I was satisfied with it. Douglas plays Nick Conklin, a scruffy American Cop who goes to Japan in order to bring a Yakuza assassin to justice. He is accompanied by his younger friend and fellow cop Charlie (Andy Garcia). The two did not expect to get caught in a war between Yakuza gangs however... That's all fine, and so is the action, but the film maintains to provide an aspect that I hate: "Black Rain" is simply so damn stereotypical that it hurts. The two American cops, Nick a rough-and-ready tough guy, Charlie a womanizing young fellow, are both really 'coool', whereas the Japanese characters are entirely stereotypical, duteous but pedantic and exaggeratedly submissive to bureaucratic rules. The constant stereotypes that are yelled at the viewer at every opportunity are really annoying and lessened my enjoyment of the film quite a bit. Otherwise, the story is decent enough (though by no means original) and the action entertains. Tomisaburo Wakayama, is, of course, great as always. My advice: In case you wanna watch films about the Yakuza, watch Japanese ones.