A technofetishist tries to enhance his leg by inserting in it a piece of metal (some sort of pipe, one feet long). Short pause. He removes the bandages around his leg... and... his do it yourself surgery has failed ! He screams a little bit and runs away...

Meanwhile, a salaryman is driving his car...

... and they both met in a car accident.

That's the begining of the end for our salaryman that will slowly transform in a pile of junk metal.

As with Eraserhead, Tetsuo is the first important movie of his author. Comparison doesn't stop there. Both movies fits on shoestring budgets, are in black and white and have a strong nightmarish feeling.

The story is quite complex and unconventionnal. It narrates the tranformation of the man into a piece of metal, his dreams, all mixed with flash backs of his life that he watches on television. You won't find the "badies against the good boy" type of story that you superficialy could find in Tetsuo II.

This movie denotes a love/hate relationship with technology. It is clear that a man that transforms in iron, enduring the most horrible pains, is a strong warn about the evil effects of technology. On the other hand, it is obvious that the author delights in the description and phantasm of the mutating salariman.

The first half of the movie is especially brilliant. The second, featuring a long fight between the mutated salaryman and his victim and then their fusion is either too difficult to understand or a bit too long (in my opinion). Anyway, it is probably necessary to see the movie two or three time to understand most of it.

Some skinheads shoot with a weird gun at a salaryman in a mall and run away. The knocked out salaryman wakes up, apparently untouched except for a large hole in his suit.

The same skinheads appears again and kidnap the young son of the salaryman. The salaryman pursue the skinheads. He's angry... very angry, so angry that suddenly, his arm mutate into a gun-like weapon and shoot at the skinheads.

The story is quite different from "Testuo the Iron Man". This is not a remake nor a sequel of the first Tetsuo. This is just another story involving humans that mutates into machinery (this time: war machinery).

Following the success of Tetsuo the Iron Man, this time, the budget is much more important. This allows for colour, much more actors, pyrotechnics, cleaner special effects and so on.

Althought complex, the story is much more easy to understand (well... at least you have some dialogues to help you understand) and a bit more conventionnal. You will nevertheless enjoy seeing it again with whole scenes taking a completely different meaning as you now know a little bit more...

The movies escalates in violence and weirdness until the end where some enlightening sickly flash backs tells you more about the perverted salaryman's childhood.

A salaryman (Tsuda) meets an old school friend (Takuji) who is now a semi-pro boxer. Tusda is both terrified and fascinated by the brute animal force of those boxers.

He comes back home where his bride (Hizuro) waits him. Takuji, the boxer friend, is invited and Hizuro, also both fascinated and repelled by him fall in a sado-maso love relationship. She'll discover and assume the hideous part of herself, became more and more violent, piercing and tatooing herself, enjoying deadly boxe matches and beating both Tsuda and Takuji.

Tsuda is jealous and enrolls himself in the same boxing school than his ex-friend (now rival) Takuji. His anger will fuel his will to mutates into a boxing killing machine.

That's the same mutation story than in Tetsuo I and II. The difference is that this time, the salaryman mutates into an angry boxer. All the machinery and industrial focused imagery is now translated into flesh and blood but still, this is the same story. The parallel between Tetsuo and Tokyo Fist shows up in many details. Here are a few examples:

In Tetsuo, as the salaryman evolves and switch from one state to another state of consciousness/mutation, he traverses rings of springs and other pieces of rotten metal. In Tokyo Fist, he goes through rings of guts and blood dripping flesh.

The cat of Tetsuo, crossbreed digested by a piece of machinery is now an exploded real dead cat eaten by worms.

Tetsuo and Tokyo Fist madnesses both take their roots in a frightening childhood traumatism.

Of course, even if Tokyo Fist implies strong physical mutations, a boxer is not that different from a salaryman, and most of the mutation takes place in the psychology of the hero.

Another difference is that the fusional end of both Tetsuos, and in general the plot involving two complementary forces is replaced by a more complex relationship between two men and a woman where each character is simultaneously attracted and repulsed by each other.