Main Cast: Christopher Walken, Willem Dafoe, Asia Argento, Yoshitaka Amano, Annabella Sciorra
Release Year: 1998
Country: US
Run Time: 92 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Plot
Abel Ferrara directed this erotic thriller adapted by Ferrara and Christ Zois from a short story by science fiction author William Gibson (in his Burning Chrome collection). Global corporations rule the world, and corporate raider Fox (Christopher Walken) and his deputy X (Willem Dafoe) could pocket $100 million if they can get top scientist Hiroshi (Yoshitaka Amano) to defect from one corporation to another. Fox offers singer Sandii (Asia Argento) $1 million to seduce Hiroshi away from his wife, family, and employer. An affair develops between Sandii and X, while she studies facts about Hiroshi's life. She departs on her assignment, but betrayals ensue, with Fox and X soon becoming targets themselves. With opening credits in three languages (English, German, Japanese), the soundtrack features the score-composition debut of hip-hopper Schoolly D, music which plays over a blank screen at the wrap-up (since the film has no closing credits). This Gibson short story was a property once in development by director Kathryn Bigelow. The title story of Gibson's Burning Chrome collection was planned as the second Heavy Metal movie, intended for live-action and scripted but never filmed. Shown in competition at the 1998 Venice Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
Adam Brightman - Co-producer, David C. Robinson - Costume Designer, Abel Ferrara - Director, Anthony Redman - Editor, Jim Moll - Editor, Christian Halsey Solomon - Executive Producer, Alessandro Camon - Executive Producer, Jay Cannold - Executive Producer, Lee Solomon - Executive Producer, Greg Woertz - Executive Producer, Schoolly D - Composer (Music Score), Frank De Curtis - Production Designer, Ken Kelsch - Cinematographer, Edward R. Pressman - Producer, Abel Ferrara - Screenwriter, Christ Zois - Screenwriter, William Gibson - Short Story Author
Fox (Walken) and X (Dafoe) play corporate extraction specialists, half headhunters, half kidnappers, who specialise in helping R&D scientists relocate from corporations who would rather see them dead than working for their competitors. Fox is obsessed with one Hiroshi (played by Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano), a paradigm-shattering super-genius who is currently working for Maas, the corporation (Gibson employs the pre-WWII term zaibatsu) who crippled him. To that end, Fox and X employ Sandii (Argento), a "Shinjuku-girl", or small-time hustler/call girl, to help "persuade" Hiroshi to defect to Hosaka, another zaibatsu to which Fox is somewhat warmer. Fox is responsible for brokering the deal with Hosaka, Sandii for getting Hiroshi to fall in love with her and defect to a Hosaka lab in Marrakech (Fox and X are based in Tokyo, hence their ability to pick up a Shinjuku girl), and X is responsible for teaching Sandii how to make Hiroshi melt.
Sandii disappears, Fox is killed, and X retreats to the safest place he knows, the New Rose Hotel, a derelict capsule hotel.
