Cure

Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s arresting international breakthrough established him as one of the leaders of an emerging new wave of Japanese horror while pushing the genre into uncharted realms of philosophical and existential exploration. A string of shocking, seemingly unmotivated murders—each committed by a different person yet all bearing the same grisly hallmarks—leads Detective Takabe (Koji Yakusho) into a labyrinthine investigation to discover what connects them, and into a disturbing game of cat and mouse with an enigmatic amnesiac (Masato Hagiwara) who may be evil incarnate. Awash in hushed, hypnotic dread, Cure is a tour de force of psychological tension and a hallucinatory journey into the darkest recesses of the human mind.

Film Info

  • Japan
  • 1997
  • 111 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.85:1
  • Japanese
  • Spine #1155

BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • 4K digital restoration, supervised by cinematographer Tokusho Kikumura, with uncompressed stereo soundtrack
  • New conversation between director Kiyoshi Kurosawa and filmmaker Ryusuke Hamaguchi
  • Interviews with actors Masato Hagiwara and Koji Yakusho
  • Interview from 2003 with Kurosawa
  • Trailers and teaser
  • PLUS: An essay by critic Chris Fujiwara

    New cover by Michael Boland

Purchase Options

BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • 4K digital restoration, supervised by cinematographer Tokusho Kikumura, with uncompressed stereo soundtrack
  • New conversation between director Kiyoshi Kurosawa and filmmaker Ryusuke Hamaguchi
  • Interviews with actors Masato Hagiwara and Koji Yakusho
  • Interview from 2003 with Kurosawa
  • Trailers and teaser
  • PLUS: An essay by critic Chris Fujiwara

    New cover by Michael Boland
Cure
Cast
Koji Yakusho
Takabe
Masato Hagiwara
Mamiya
Tsuyoshi Ujiki
Sakuma
Anna Nakagawa
Fumie Takabe
Yukijiro Hotaru
Kuwano
Yoriko Doguchi
Dr. Miyajima
Denden
Oida
Ren Osugi
Fujiwara
Masahiro Toda
Hanaoka
Credits
Director
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Written by
Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Executive producer
Hiroyuki Kato
Chief producer
Tetsuya Ikeda
Chief producer
Satoshi Kanno
Producer
Tsutomu Tsuchikawa
Producer
Atsuyuki Shimoda
Cinematographer
Tokusho Kikumura
Production designer
Tomoyuki Maruo
Editor
Kan Suzuki
Music
Gary Ashiya

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By Chris Fujiwara

The Psychosocial Dread at the Heart of Japanese Horror
The Psychosocial Dread at the Heart of Japanese Horror

From Kaneto Shindo to Kiyoshi Kurosawa, the masters of the genre over the past half-century have tapped into a deep well of cultural anxiety, exploring everything from the sins of their nation’s feudal past to the dangers of new technologies.

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