The film explores in multi-layered depths how violence begets violence and how this cycle, once started, is nearly impossible to break.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Jun 19, 2003

Loud, direct, and uncompromised, Brother is raw red meat in an age of cinematic tofu.

| Sep 4, 2001

It's rougher stuff than most would expect, though not unrewarding in its own horrific way.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 14, 2001

As an actor and writer-director, Mr. Kitano projects an amused irony that makes his films worth seeing.

| Aug 3, 2001

Just how many acts of self-inflicted finger amputations do I really want to see?

Full Review | Jul 27, 2001

Sure to satisfy fans of the laconic auteur.

| Jul 27, 2001

Kitano presents all this mayhem in crisp and cool camera work that distances it and keeps it from becoming oppressive.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 27, 2001

Intriguing though uneven.

Full Review | Jul 27, 2001

A provocative variation on moviedom's worn cross-cultural themes.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 27, 2001

This somber and bloody retread is hardly the best place to first make Kitano's intimidating acquaintance.

| Jul 27, 2001

Rarely has such an artful aesthetic been used to craft such sadistically violent junk.

| Jul 27, 2001

Too many of the killing scenes have a casual, perfunctory tone.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jul 27, 2001

There's nothing noble about Aniki's steadfastness; he's a violent thug who's simply more skilled and efficient than the other thugs surrounding him.

Full Review | Jul 27, 2001

When it works, which is often, Kitano's movie is an anthropology of the distinctions between Japanese yakuza and American gangsters.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jul 26, 2001

We're made numb to the violence and bored by the lack of plot or character development.

Full Review | Jul 26, 2001

What [Kitano fans are] looking for are increasingly novel and outrageous ways to ambush, mutilate and assassinate. And their hero doesn't disappoint.

Full Review | Jul 26, 2001

For all its arty bloodshed, Brother is disappointingly hollow.

Full Review | Jul 26, 2001

Riveting, if erratic.

| Jul 20, 2001

If the film had ended a couple of scenes earlier, on a touch that's a tribute to westerns and showdowns, Mr. Kitano would have finished things off beautifully. But that's a minor quibble.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 20, 2001

Takeshi's elliptical directorial style is here overwhelmed by the script's crudeness and lack of narrative power.

Full Review | Jul 20, 2001