Throw Down

Director: Johnnie To

2004 / 95min / DCP

To’s often irreverent, always cinematographically exuberant homage to Japanese master Akira Kurosawa highlights a very Japanese martial art rarely focused on in kung fu-crazy Hong Kong cinema: namely, judo. Former champ Sze-to Bo (Louis Koo), now a washed-up, debt-saddled drunk who keeps his reasons for leaving the sport behind at the height of his powers a closely guarded secret, is lured back to prove himself anew by aspiring songbird Cherrie Ying and up-and-coming fighter Aaron Kwok, with longtime rival Tony Leung Ka-fai the last item on Bo’s busy dance card. A personal favorite of To’s and, in its absence of constantly discharging firearms and other signatures, something of an outlier in his filmography.

Distributor: Janus Films

Part of Sukiyaki Bebop