Kei Fujiwara, Nobu Kanaoka, Shinya Tsukamoto

Shinya Tsukamoto draws on the marriage of flesh and technology that inspires so much of David Cronenberg's work and then twists it into a manga-influenced cyberpunk vision. A man (Tomoroh Taguchi) awa...( read more  read more... )kens from a nightmare in which his body is helplessly fusing with the metal objects around him, only to find it happening to him in real life... or is it? Haunted by memories of a hit and run (eerily prophetic of Cronenberg's Crash), the man knows this ordeal could be a dream, a fantastic form of divine retribution, or perhaps technological mutation born of guilt and rage. Shot in bracing black and white on a small budget, Tsukamoto puts a demented conceptual twist on good old-fashioned stop-motion effects and simple wire work, giving his film the surreal quality of a waking dream with a psychosexual edge (resulting in the film's most disturbing scene). The story ultimately takes on an abstract quality enhanced by the grungy look and increasingly wild images as they take to the streets in a mad chase of technological speed demons. This first entry in his self-titled "Regular Sized Monster Series" is followed by a full-color sequel, Tetsuo II: The Body Hammer, which trades the muddy experimental atmosphere for a big-budget sheen but can't top the cybershock to the system this movie packs. --Sean Axmaker

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79% liked it

2,552 ratings

Unrated, 92 min.

Directed by: Shinya Tsukamoto

Release Date: January 1, 1989

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DVD Release Date: February 18, 1998

Stats: 814 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (814)


  • September 18, 2008
    A Japanese Lynch or Cronenberg; I can't decide. So bizarre you can't look away.
  • December 23, 2007
    Twisted artistic expeimental madness. A plot is buried deep within the dark industrial visuals somewhere but this is more demonstrating of low budget black and white photogrophy. Reminiscent of David Lynch, this is certainly more like a very bad dream than an actual film. Great e...( read more)xample of style over substance and the style being enough to sustain the running time.
  • June 8, 2007
    A low budget psychological horror shot in grainy black and white is more an exercise in cinematic surrealism than a narrative story in it's truest sense. Full of disturbing cyberpunk imagery, this is not to everyone's taste but fans of Lynch's Eraserhead and the work of David Cro...( read more)nenberg should check it out. There was also an impressive sequel made on a considerably larger budget.
  • May 11, 2007
    Bizarro film about a man who slowly becomes a machine. More of a music video than a film. Particularly memorable is the rape by machine.
  • December 1, 2006
    Still holds well to this day, Tsukamoto has certainly growed a lot as a filmaker. Some of his methods may have changed but themes are still very much the same, the lost of hummanity in urban scenarios, and how said enviroments can affect the way people live.
  • September 20, 2009
    insane. insane. insane. i wanted to laugh, cry, cringe, and shoot myself in the head all at once during the "sex" scene.
  • September 11, 2009
    Review coming someday...

    98/100
  • August 19, 2009
    Excellent homoerotic S&M torture porno splatter cyberpunk surrealist gorefest horror action film.
  • August 17, 2009
    a good insight of the whole cyberpunk movement. Dark, with no compromise, and an unstoppable train of thoughts
    to where the humanity is leading us.. im probably as unclear as the movie can be... just sit and watch.
  • August 17, 2009
    A movie I deem worthy of the prestigious word classic and inspiring. Everything about this movie is phenomenal. This is a truly avant-garde, cyberpunk mindfuck of a movie that even had Alejandro Jodorowsky standing on his feet applauding when it debuted at the Fantastia Film Fest...( read more)ival.

    There are many themes people can pick up on, most notably the fear of technology. Relevant then, relevant now. But is there more to it? I think so. Some people think that it has to do with the widespread epidemic of AIDS in Japan, and when one thinks about it, it fits perfectly well with what's going on onscreen. However, people also said this about Carpenter's The Thing, and that turned out to be false since the movie came out before AIDS was widely known as being the deadly contagion that it is. Who knows? Just my thoughts.

    The score by Chu Ishikawa is filled with harsh industrial beats and clangs, and has inspired many industrial bands (most notably Front Line Assembly). The images of the Fetish in his cyberpunk lair, filled with twisting skeletal pipes and vein-like wires is so cool to look at. Maybe it's because of the hard-on I have for industrial settings, but this is probably one of the coolest shots I have ever seen.The make-up is great. The locations are beautiful and eerily creepy at the same time. Costumes are gorgeous. Everything is perfect. Tsukamoto plays his part wonderfully. I love this movie.

    There are many themes people can pick up on, most notably the fear of technology. Relevant then, relevant now. But is there more to it? I think so. Some people think that it has to do with the widespread epidemic of AIDS in Japan, and when one thinks about it, it fits perfectly well with what's going on onscreen. However, people also said this about Carpenter's The Thing, and that turned out to be false since the movie came out before AIDS was widely known as being the deadly contagion that it is. Who knows? Just my thoughts.

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