Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989, Shinya Tsukamoto)

Thursday 26th of January, 6:15pm in the Richard Hoggart Building cinema (Room 104)

Join us on Thursday, 26th January (doors 6pm for a 6:15 start) in the RHB cinema (room 104) for a screening of Tetsuo: The Iron Man. The film is just 67 minutes long, so we should be finished before 7:30.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man is a 1989 Japanese cult body horror film written, directed, starring and produced by Shinya Tsukamoto, made on a shoestring budget (what little money he could pull together from his day job) and using Tsukamoto’s flat as both a filming location and production base. The film is very often characterized as Japan’s answer to David Cronenberg’s technologically charged titles like Videodrome (1983) or eXistenZ (1999). It’s clear why: Tsukamoto’s film explores the fetishization of technology, and its penetration into our lives and bodies (literally). The stop motion body horror effects are lower budget than Cronenberg’s, but no less effective. The result is surreal and frequently disturbing, but also unexpectedly funny at times.

Filming was reportedly an intense affair. The black and white 16mm camera work was carried out by Tsukamoto and Kei Fujiwara, who also acted in the film, with a cast of just six. Filmed over 18 months, with the majority of the cast living on set; by the time filming wrapped most of the crew had quit and Tsukamoto considered burning the negative. When the film screened at the 1989 Fantafestival in Rome (which it won) it had no subtitles, which Tsukamoto couldn’t afford.

Following this troubled production, Tetsuo had an unsteady release: after its success in Rome it achieved a limited theatrical run in Japan and later in the US, before release on laserdisc and VHS in the early 1990s. Perhaps surprising given the significance of its impact on the reception of Japanese independent cinema in Europe and the US, after two DVD releases the film has been out of print since 2005, and has been difficult to come by. That is, until a 2020 Blu-Ray release of Tetsuo, alongside Tsukamoto’s other work.

You can read about the film in this BFI article from 2019, or watch Mark Kermode’s two minute review.