Fumiki Kaneko’s Kisarazu Cat’s Eye: The Movie is a theatrical continuation of the 9-episode TV drama which aired from January to March of 2002 on TBS. As is always the case with movies like this, it sort of begs the question: do you need to watch the show to understand the movie? Not really, but it couldn’t hurt. Comedy guru Kankuro Kudo wrote the storyline of both the show and movie, and his frenetic pacing can be extremely confusing to the uninitiated—mixing in bits of Japanese pop culture and funny speech patterns that may go over the heads of most western viewers. However, if you can endure the incredibly spastic first 30 minutes—that seemingly presumes everyone watching has seen the original TV show and knows about each character’s quirks and personal relationships—everything will eventually make sense.

The film begins after the events of the TV show as Bussan (Junichi Okada) is told by his new doctor that he has six months to live due to terminal cancer. This news is particularly annoying given the fact that he was told the exact same thing six months earlier and had already been planning his final days accordingly. Bussan and his tight-knit group of friends are members of the Kisarazu Cats baseball team, but since none of them ended up getting drafted in high school, they’re already considered has-beens in their early-20s. When Bussan received his first cancer diagnosis he decided to live his life to the fullest—which, to him, meant playing baseball, drinking beer, and committing robberies for good causes while gleefully pointing out how much every theft is like “Lupin”. Now with 6 more months to work with, he doesn’t really know what to do with himself.

The story of the movie takes countless twists and turns, but a few specific threads stand out as the earth-shattering revelations that actually matter in the long run. First off, Mr. Yamaguchi (Tomomitsu Yamaguchi), the local yakuza/business man/expert celebrity impersonator opens a new Korean pub and hires Doraneko (Sadao Abe) as manager. This wouldn’t be a big deal, but Bussan meets the future girl of his dreams there: a Korean hostess with a limited grasp on the Japanese language named Yukhei (Son Ha Yoon). He meets her again later at the local theater during a Show Aikawa movie. During the TV series it was made abundantly clear that Bussan has a total mancrush on Aikawa; and he even got to meet him a few times. Yukhei, however, just refers to him as “yakuza” and uses his movies to learn more Japanese.

Next, Ozzy (Arata Furuta), the homeless drunk that everyone in Kisarazu knew and loved suddenly shows up in town again—completely naked. This news is particularly surprising considering he was murdered a year earlier after running afoul of a gang of drug-dealers. There wasn’t any doubt about his death at the time; they saw his corpse and the city held a funeral. Nevertheless, the cats are just happy to have their friend back and immediately begin bringing him beer after beer like the old days without questioning the situation too much.

Local rock band Kishidan return to town and give the cats a chance to open their next live show, The Fuji(mi) Rock Festival, as repayment for helping them out in the past. The only requirement is that they write an original love song, since their old one was just a rip-off of Hito ni Yasashiku by The Blue Hearts.

All of these seemingly unrelated storylines are eventually tied together in a way that only a Kudo screenplay really can. The rest of the film consists of several blasts from the past, revelations brought on by time-warp storytelling, sex with bikini-clad island natives, and a few dozen emphatic “MAJIDE?!” moments. All told, this movie probably packs as much excitement into 2 hours as the original series packed into 7. It might seem a bit confusing at first, but if you stick with it and avoid a complete cerebral meltdown during the first act you’re in for a fun, goofy experience.

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