Black Rain (1989) Paramount/Action RT: 125 minutes Rated R (language, graphic violence) Director: Ridley Scott Screenplay: Craig Bolotin and Warren Lewis Music: Hans Zimmer Cinematography: Jan de Bont Release date: September 22, 1989 (US) Cast: Michael Douglas, Andy Garcia, Ken Takakura, Kate Capshaw, Yusaku Matsuda, Shigeru Koyama, John Spencer, Guts Ishimatsu, Yuya Uchida, Tomisaburo Wakayama, Miyuki Ono, Luis Guzman, John A. Costelloe, Stephen Root, Richard Riehle. Box Office: $46.2M (US)/$134.2M (World)
Rating: ** ½
Black Rain is a perfect example of “style-over-substance”. It’s slick and visually impressive, but its impressive visual sense ultimately overpowers the thin plot and underdeveloped characters. This fairly routine police actioner stars Michael Douglas (Fatal Attraction) as a New York City cop chasing an escaped killer in Japan. It starts off well enough, but settles in to a standard fish-out-of-water story once the situation is established.
There really isn’t a lot to Black Rain, but the heavy visuals make it seem more convoluted than it really is. As much as I like director Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner), his movies tend to favor style over substance as is the case with his previous effort, Someone to Watch over Me (1987), a sexual thriller oozing with style and little else. That’s not to say his movies are bad, they’re really not for the most part. In fact, I really like many of Scott’s films. But there’s no denying that they’re often superficial and insubstantial.
Nick Conklin (Douglas) and his partner Charlie Vincent (Garcia, The Untouchables) witness the double slaying of Mafia gangsters at the hands of Sato (Matsuda) who turns out to be a Yakuza (i.e. a Japanese gangster). After apprehending him, they’re ordered to escort him back to Osaka and turn him over to the police there. Nick doesn’t like this development, but agrees to do in light of an ongoing Internal Affairs investigation into missing drug money. IA likes Nick for it even though he vehemently denies all accusations. They arrive in Osaka and are tricked into turning Sato over to gangsters posing as cops. When the real police arrive, the sukiyaki really hits the fan.
Not wanting to leave their business unfinished, Nick convinces police officials to allow him and Charlie to assist in the hunt for Sato. They’re assigned to Assistant Investigator Matsumoto (Takakura), a cop who firmly believes in honor and duty. They soon learn of an ongoing gang war between Sato and Sugai (Wakayama), a major crime boss under whom Sato once served as lieutenant.
Compelling though the story maybe, it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. For example, why would police officials allow Nick to leave the country while he’s under investigation? Isn’t that against police procedure? What about this? Where is the Mafia? You’d think that they’d want to retaliate for Sato murdering two of their own. And how is it that an American nightclub hostess (Capshaw, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) knows so much about the Yakuza, a secretive criminal organization that Japanese citizens don’t know all that much about? I suspect that Scott intended for the visuals to compensate for the plot holes in Black Rain. It does look good though. Tall buildings with neon advertisements dominate the skyline much in the same way as they did in Blade Runner. At night, people retire to crowded nightclubs to drink and sing karaoke. Many shots in Black Rain seem influenced by MTV music videos. The movie teems with atmosphere, but little else.
Douglas, one of my favorite actors, does a decent job playing a most unsympathetic character. Besides his questionable ethics, he has racist tendencies. In one scene, he uses a very offensive term when asking his partner if anyone in the building speaks English. I won’t repeat it, but it begins with “n” and rhymes with “dip”. In movies like Black Rain, it’s customary for flawed characters to undergo some sort of change and gain an understanding of that which they initially dislike. I didn’t quite believe it in this instance. It feels forced and insincere mainly due to the character’s cold nature. Matsuda’s villain comes off as a cartoon sometimes thanks to his overacting. Garcia comes off best as Nick’s good-humored partner and we all know what happens to nice guys in movies like Black Rain.
Expectedly, the script makes mention of concepts like honor and the fact that Nick has none. It also emphasizes the differences between American and Japanese culture, law enforcement in particular. It all comes down to Nick not understanding the way things are done in Japan. The movie has a few decent action sequences like the opening motorcycle chase and the gunfight in a steel mill. It’s a very watchable movie but alas, not a very good one. It makes a nice diversion on a dull Saturday night; you’ll just wish there had been more to it.
