The Man Behind the Scissors centers around two serial killers: mastermind Yasunaga and helper Chinatsu. The two risk being found out when the police question them as witnesses to a gruesome murder they themselves may have committed. A quirky and perplexing police thriller centered around two murderers who thrive on slicing up schoolgirls. Calculated serial psycho Yasunaga (Tokokawa) and Chinatsu (Aso), his sweet female sidekick, find themselves being questioned as witnesses to a murder when their next potential victim turns up dead...with their M.O.
Acting
Toyokawa's chillingly calm killer vs. Abe's exhausted detective.
Direction
Ikeda weaponizes awkward silences until you want to scream.
Editing
Flashback structure that keeps you complicit in every cut.
Director
Toshiharu Ikeda
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Part of Japan's early-2000s 'psycho-couple' boom alongside films like 'Audition' and 'Visitor Q,' reflecting anxieties about alienated youth and failed social integration.
Director Toshiharu Ikeda died by suicide in 2010; his filmography, including this and 'Evil Dead Trap,' increasingly reads as an extended meditation on watching and being watched.
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