The highspeed bullet train says Japan as much as Godzilla, sushi and Mount Fuji. And it takes center stage in Shinji Higuchi’s new film, “Bullet Train Explosion,” which premieres on Netflix Wednesday.
Higuchi, the director of the 2016 “Shin Godzilla” (or “New Godzilla,") has reimagined the 1975 Japanese film “The Bullet Train," which has the same premise: A bomb will go off if the train slows down below 100 kph (62 mph.) That original movie also inspired Hollywood’s “Speed,” starring Keanu Reeves, which takes place mostly on a bus.
Higuchi recalls being fascinated by the aerodynamically shaped bullet trains growing up as they roared by, almost like a violent animal. To him, as with many Japanese, the Shinkansen — as the trains are called in Japan — symbolize the nation’s efforts to become “top-rate,” superfast, precise, orderly and on time.
“It’s so characteristically Japanese," Higuchi said in an interview with The Associated Press on Tuesday. “To complete your work, even if it means sacrificing your personal life, is like a samurai spirit living within all Japanese."
The film's realism was achieved by a smooth combination of computer graphics and miniature train models, built to one-sixth the size of the real thing.
A huge LED wall was used on the set to project visuals of passing landscapes as seen from the train window, and those shots were juxtaposed seamlessly with footage shot on a real train.
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The explosions are strangely exhilarating, and beautifully depicted with scattering sparks and smoke.
Higuchi stressed that the filmmakers were careful to make sure the criminal act, as depicted, is not physically possible today.
He said “Bullet Train Explosion” marked a challenging departure from his past movies that were about heroes and monsters.
“I examined the question of evil, and how we pass judgment on a person,” he said.
“That’s what my predecessors did as directors before me: Try to show what happens if you commit evil," he added. "And I tried to give my answer.”
One departure from the original, which starred the late Ken Takakura as the bomber, is that Higuchi chose to focus on the train workers.
Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, formerly a member of boys’ band Smap who portrayed a transgender woman in Eiji Uchida’s “Midnight Swan,” is convincing as a dedicated Shinkansen worker.
“I always have fun working with the director,” Kusanagi said of Higuchi at a Tokyo premiere earlier this week. “I’ve loved him for 20 years.”
Kusanagi starred in “Sinking of Japan,” Higuchi’s 2006 science-fiction thriller about a natural catastrophe that threatens Japan’s very existence.
East Japan Railway Co., formed after the national railway was privatized, which operates the bullet train featured in Higuchi’s reboot, gave full support to the film. It allowed the use of real trains, railway facilities and uniforms, as well as helping train the actors to simulate its workers and their mannerisms.
The bullet trains have long been a symbol of Japan’s blossoming as a modern economy and peaceful culture in the decades following World War II.
The first leg, connecting Tokyo with Osaka, opened with much fanfare in 1964. The system now connects much of Japan, from the northernmost main island of Hokkaido through southwestern Kyushu. The train featured in Higuchi’s work connects Tokyo with northern Aomori.