CLOUD (2024)

4 stars

Blue Finch Film Releasing. Cinema. Out Now

In the first hour of psychological thriller CLOUD we follow Ryosuke Yoshii (Masaki Suda) who has a low grade job in a factory. He has a side hustle (doesn’t everybody these days) buying up items on the cheap and reselling them online — even if they are of dubious origins. Despite being offered a promotion, he decides to quit and go in full time selling goods on the web.

To this end he decides to move to a remote lakeside house with his somewhat vacuous girlfriend Akiko (Katone Fukukawa, in a seemingly thankless role) as it will give him more space to expand his stock. He uses the name Ratel to hide behind his activities, as much of it is less than legal, and is successful enough to be able to take on an assistant, Sano (Daiken Okudaira), who will figure significantly later.

However Yoshii’s actions will eventually come back to haunt him.

Halfway into the story it flips from being a drama to a more intense action movie with horror overtones. Several men turn up at his location and threaten him. They are people he has wronged in some way. The film turns from an exploration of the ethics and practices involved in online selling to a violent kidnap and revenge scenario with much gunfire.

In some ways you don’t have much sympathy for Yoshii’s predicament as he has brought it upon himself — the question is does he deserve the possible fate that awaits for simply selling stuff at inflated prices?

This is the latest from Kiyoshi Kurosawa – probably best known for CURE (1997), PULSE (2001), and TOKYO SONATA (2008). Like many Japanese films it is slow to start. Building the character of the protagonist, who isn’t exactly likeable. It kicks into high gear once the disgruntled intruders arrive. Suda is good in the central role, as the seemingly closed off Ratel, who is more interested in scalping folks online, than the folks around him and the script has some unexpected twists.

Steve Kirkham