Japanese Cyberpunk is a genre of underground film produced in Japan starting in the late 1980s. The genre is not very closely related to Cyberpunk as understood in the west — the focus is industrial and incomprehensible, not high-tech and scientific. The genre is primarily defined by the movie Tetsuo: The Iron Man.[1]
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Japanese Cyberpunk generally involves the main characters going through monstrous, incomprehensible metamorphosis in an industrial setting. Many of these films have scenes that fall into the experimental film genre; they often involve purely abstract or visual sequences that may or may not relate to the characters and plot. Recurring themes include: mutation, technology, dehumanization, repression and sexual deviance.[2]
Burst City has been a huge inspiration on the entire underground Japanese film scene over the past 25 years.[3] and more specifically, Shigeru Izumiya starred in it before going on to direct Death Powder four years later. The Phantom of Regular Size is the early short by Shinya Tsukamoto that he expanded into Tetsuo: The Iron Man a few years later.
Some defining films in the genre include:[4]
Related films include:
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