Ghost Killer – Review | Fantastic Fest (4/5)

GHOST KILLER is a Japanese Supernatural Action-Thriller with a World Premiere at Fantastic Fest 2024. It’s absolutely awesome, so you’ll want to check it out as soon as possible. Read our full Ghost Killer movie review here!

GHOST KILLER is a new action-thriller from Japan. Its plot is essentially a supernatural horror story but with action and comedy as the main drivers. I absolutely loved it and highly recommend it!

This Japanese Supernatural Action-Thriller just celebrated its World Premiere at Fantastic Fest 2024. I think it’s the perfect place for it to premiere as it’s a gorgeous genre hybrid that deserves a strong world premiere.

Continue reading our Ghost Killer movie review below.

A new kind of ghost story

If you remember the iconic 1990 movie Ghost, then you should imagine a young Japanese girl instead of the Whoopi Goldberg character, and a Japanese hitman instead of the charming and kind character played by Patrick Swayze.

Also, a lot of amazing stunts and action sequences with the most delicious martial arts fight scenes!

Fumika Matsuoka (Akari Takaishi) is a young woman struggling with all the same issues as any other young person. She’s getting an education while holding a crappy job to live in her tiny (yet barely affordable) apartment.

Also, her best friend has a boyfriend who is abusive and she’s constantly fighting off much older men, who think they can get with her.

All is normal for Fumika until she becomes the vessel for a professional assassin. Hideo Kudo (Masanori Mimoto) is the ghost of the assassin who is now following her around. And yes, sometimes takes over her body.

However, only with her consent. The first accidental possession wasn’t one either of them expected. Now, to get rid of this ghost, she must help him make things right. In the case of Hideo, he must avenge his own death by killing his assassin.

Also, Hideo is more than happy to help Fumika dole out some justice of her own along the way.

Ghost Killer premiered at Fantastic Fest 2024

Ghost Killer is directed by Kensuke Sonomura. He has been a stunt performer and action director on almost 70 feature films. Basically, he has made a huge impact on the way Japanese action has evolved over the past two decades.

Looking at movies that have screened at Fantastic Fest, he’s been the lead fight choreographer for six titles. His style is unbelievably smooth and so damn fast. If you blink, you will miss awesome moves.

Of course, this also requires a lot of the two lead actors, but Akari Takaishi (as Fumika) and Masanori Mimoto (as Hideo) are more than up for the task. Also, both have excellent comedic timing which is another thing required in this movie.

Ghost Killer is a movie you should look forward to checking out. In fact, I’m already looking forward to watching it again!

Ghost Killer is reviewed as part of our Fantastic Fest 2024 coverage.

Details

Director: Kensuke Sonomura
Writer: Yugo Sakamoto
Stars: Akari Takaishi, Mario Kuroba, Masanori Mimoto