There's only one major beef I have with Beautiful Weapon. Central Park Media's Asia Pulp Cinema subdivision classifies it as "hard-boiled action," which couldn't be further from the truth. Beautiful Weapon is, through and through, a bleak and tragic drama. Let's call a spade a spade, huh? Besides that, Beautiful Weapon is an excellent genre piece, which comes highly recommended.

In a pitch-black room, two lovers are heard in the throes of passion. They finish, two post-coital gunshots are fired, and the woman leaves the room. Quite the introduction for the unnamed, eponymous Beautiful Weapon (I'll refer to her as BW from now on). She quickly drowns herself in a glass of liquor, much to the chagrin of her mentor, who berates her on her alcoholism, then unsuccessfully attempts to seduce her. BW's an assassin for a ruthless criminal, her M.O. involving sleeping with, then gunning down those who cross her boss. Unfortunately, her growing loathing of herself and her job has her marked as a loose cannon, and the boss wants her dead. Throw in two other assassins (one who works at a coffee shop, the other is a semi-professional piano player. Even hired killers need jobs on the side to make ends meet.) an unexpected love affair, and a disturbing revelation, and you've got a densely packed 95 minutes ahead of you.

The thing I enjoyed about Beautiful Weapon was that it never slowed down. There were no parts that dragged. Every scene was relevant and important to the story. Special kudos also goes to Masumi Miyazaki, who portrayed BW with genuine sadness and desperation. You genuinely feel for her character, and grow to despise her situation, trapped in a profession she needs and hates to be involved in. Besides her, all the major players are just as well developed characters. The boss is a depraved pervert, conducting meetings from between his mistress's legs. BW's mentor is bitter from years of unrequited love for our heroine. The piano player is a confused alcoholic, torn between love and a job. The movie as a whole was very poignant, with some genuinely sweet moments between the two assassins. Some of the direction was amazing as well, with some great angles and some smart use of light and shadow. A perfect example is the aforementioned first scene, in which the dark bedroom is illuminated momentarily by muzzle flashes.

Picture quality is a bit of a disappointment. Colors range from rich and vibrant to washed and hazy. Black levels aren't really where they should be, with a lot of grain and artifacting in the night scenes. There was also a decent amount of print damage evident. The movie is presented full-frame, and I honestly couldn't tell if it was the original ratio or not. Most scenes seemed properly framed, but some had odd cut-off points, implying that maybe the movie had been reformatted. Audio is presented in both Japanese and English Stereo. However, the original Japanese is the only real way to watch it. The dubbed English track is painfully bad, with some horribly hammy voice actors who sound too much like cartoon characters to take seriously. Extras include a fun little trivia game, a armload of trailers for other Central Park Media releases, and a still gallery.

I feel that Beautiful Weapon may become a victim of misclassification. Those who pick it up for fast action will be sorely disappointed. However, those looking for a genuinely good drama with a more emotional kick to it will be very pleased.

For more info visit Asia Pulp Cinema online.