Raw, cheap, on-the-fly, rock’n’roll non-stop meat n’potatoes action brawler ISOLATED just smashed its way into the action-movies-of-the-year discussion. On a shoestring budget, it brazenly pushes and shoves far above its weight class, burning with an ambition larger than the means to accomplish anything. This is ISOLATED and it also mirrors the lead character Tamura Yuto (played by Yamaguchi Yoshiyuko), a grizzled, stubborn will of power, loading up and gettin’ his fist ready already when walking through the door. Going in, I had no idea that this is a spin-off movie to UNIFICATION OF JAPAN, a 68-part (?!) Yakuza soap opera movie series. And while that might seem daunting, you don’t need to have seen or know anything to enjoy this bone-breaking banger. It might actually be for the better; not already knowing these characters or their relations makes for a fun ride.
As the story goes, this beast of a man is looking for his buddy inside a generic factory setting. Tamura Yuto is portrayed as this noir tinged force of nature animal, rushing straight in, head first, serving up sock-it-to-‘em, punch-up brawler mayhem. The bare bones set-up is telling: ISOLATED is built from the most rudimentary action movie building blocks. Being so upfront and clear about it is refreshing. Take the generic factory setting for example, where countless low-grade Direct-To-Video action movies have come to die when running low on ideas and out of money. ISOLATED begins at the factory, already from the get-go without the money, but with a firm grasp of one glorious idea; let your blood, sweat, and tears do the heavy lifting and carry you through on sheer will power.
Henchmen keep pouring out from every nook and cranny of the factory, inviting a variety of shootouts, hand-to-hand and weapon-based combat. Every now and then, bigger fight scenes erupt featuring somewhat more quirky mid-bosses (one carries around his glue and broken glass kit, one chews gum). Lurking somewhere in the dark is another, even bigger beast of a man. Interspersed between punches and headshots are brief flashback story snippets signalled by big title cards like ”2 hours earlier”, ”4 hours earlier”. During the 90s, the Direct-to-Video movie production company PM-Entertainment’s recipe was (to jolt you awake or not reaching for the remote) to have some kind of action happen every 7 minutes or so. It could be anything: a boob, a couple of kick-boxers sparring for a bit, a car flipping or something more substantial like a full on shootout, car chase, or fight scene. In ISOLATED, there is a reversal: it features a bit of story every now and then to break up the onslaught of bone-breaking fisticuffs. There is even a flashback mid fight scene to another action scene, a car chase shootout, so much action it has to fold it in layers. This is action for action’s sake, an action designer’s and stunt people’s playground.
Not to cut ISOLATED short, it does have a couple of narrative tricks up its sleeve. While the non-linear structure of the plot might feel a tad tired and over and done with as a stylistic narrative choice, it becomes pretty clear that it is in service of the action. And it works beautifully; it has this knucklehead, full-force, forward approach that mirrors its lead character. It engages through blunt force, broken bones (and glass) trauma, and non-stop action. But then, unexpectedly it’s revealed that ISOLATED actually handles this nonlinear stuff quite well. There is some elegance at play here, by establishing itself as a full speed ahead, bare bones brawler, it can through very small means inject character moments to surprising effect and show things from different perspectives. When any kind of subtlety isn’t expected at all, the smallest grace and moment stand out all the more. The movie also veers away from the inevitable stylistic choices this brazen form is usually saddled with: messy, cluttered editing, and frenetic camera work to seem energetic, punk and/or cool; instead, it opts for clearly shot and edited action. That’s not to say there aren’t several choices that come across as subpar, like the constant, awful music, the “have you forgotten this moment one second ago?”-flashbacks, the very cheap look and the, thankfully few and far between, clunky exposition scenes. Those flashbacks and the exposition scenes are particularly lazy to lean on as an expression for a director on his 178th movie.
Since most of this movie is fighting, it would be easy to suggest action director Koichi Sakamoto basically directed most of it, but there is enough here of interest in the non-action parts of the movie and in the structuring, whereas the subtle small things that do work (small character bits, parts of the nonlinear narrative structure), and the avoidance of the aforementioned stylistic choices, hint at an experienced and assured hand. There is a flair to some narrative and character details not present in Sakamoto’s own work – referring mainly to four of his directing works: Wicked Game (2002), Broken Path (2008), 009-1: The End of the Beginning (2013) and the more recent, and one of 2022’s best action movies, the made-for-TV Good Morning, Sleeping Lion – meaning Hiroyuki Tsuji does seem to bring something to the table even if ISOLATED is probably 80% action. What is present however in those works and in those 80% of ISOLATED is blistering, fast, hard-hitting scraps, stunt guys flippin and hitting the floor, and booming sound effects. Shot mostly in wides, with some non intrusive « camera follows motion » work, it strikes a solid balance between longer takes and shorter dynamic inserts.
Koichi Sakamoto is probably most known in the west for his work on the beloved Mark Dacascos vehicle Drive (1997), one of the finest American martial arts centric action movies of the 90s. Since then, he has churned out Kamen Rider flicks like there’s no tomorrow, and before that he and his team sharpened their teeth on Power Rangers. He and his action team can probably stage and film 20 action scenes a day without breaking a sweat. ISOLATED, in being so deliberate and unashamed in its seemingly one-note, bare bones approach, and then revealing those few sprinkles of something more nuanced, makes it easy to forgive the hiccups and let the smackdowns and beatdowns carry it through. It’s only towards the very end that it runs out of steam, when thinking it needs to tie things together. While it would have been amazing if it ended on a high note and didn’t stumble in its singular approach, ISOLATED has, by then, already delivered so much.
This raw, unabashedly low-grade brawler basically plays like the spiritual successor to its action director Koichi Sakamoto’s own non-stop onslaught of a glorified stunt reel stretched out to feature length, and underground fan favorite fight fest BROKEN PATH (2008), and is something to rejoice for the hardcore action movie fan. A rough rush-and-tumble embodiment of action cinema, scruffy and cheap. The infectious, ambitious, joyous energy and sheer amount of action more than makes up for any of its shortcomings. ISOLATED triumphs past biases and preconceived notions of what constitutes good or bad, wielding reduction and generosity, honing in on action cinema as a sheer joy of purity. I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.
ISOLATED had its International Premiere at Big Bad Film Fest 2025.
ISOLATED – No European release date yet
Directed by Hiroyuki Tsuji
With Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, Ryo Tajima, Kenta Kawasaki
Film Exposure 