Serpent’s Path (2024) / Le chemin du serpent 
蛇の道 「Hebi no Michi」
Release Date: June 14th, 2024
Duration: 116 mins.
Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Writer: Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Aurelien Ferenczi (Adapted Screenplay), Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Hiroshi Takahashi (Original Screenplay),
Starring: Ko Shibasaki, Damien Bonnard, Hidetoshi Nishijima, Mathieu Amalric, Munetaka Aoki, Gregoire Colin,
Website Twitter: @eigahebinomichi JFDB IMDB
Nearly 30 years ago, Kiyoshi Kurosawa released a double-bill of films, both starring Sho Aikawa and both based on the same revenge-thriller storyline of a man getting even with gangsters over the death of his daughter. They were Serpent’s Path (co-starring Teruyuki Kagawa) and Eyes of the Spider (co-starring Ren Osugi) and they were the result of a deal the studio Daiei made with him following the success of his serial-killer thriller Cure. Nearly 30 years later, Kurosawa was asked by Cinefrance Studios which of his films would he like to remake and he chose Serpent’s Path.
There’s no real reason for an update as to why considering the original was tightly wound perfection due to its cast (and cards on table, I prefer Eyes of the Spider because it features passages of whimsy, which is probably the reason why it was not considered).
His latest iteration is, itself a fine film that mostly follows the same story but switches locations from Japan to France, changes the antagonists from gangsters to a shadowy medical institute, and gender-swaps a character. She comes with an additional subplot. That gender change adds an interesting dynamic.
To begin at the beginning, Serpent’s Path 2024 is set in Paris. We follow a freelance journalist named Albert Bachelet (Damien Bonnard who kidnaps a series of people connected to an organisation known as the Minard Institute. Ostensibly a charity of sorts, he suspects child trafficking and the involvement of certain members in his own daughter’s murder. His modus operandi is to tase his target, bundle them into a sleeping bag, and then bundle that sleeping bag into the back of his black car. Clumsy, over-zealous, he’d be liable to make a mistake if it wasn’t for the cool-headed Sayoko Niijima (Kou Shibasaki playing the role originally made for Sho Aikawa), a Japanese psychiatrist who takes a forensic interest is aiding him. With a cold persona, she represents logic while he is emotion, driven by anger and fear such as he is.
Their goal is the head of the Minard institute and we drop in on this odd couple during their first kidnapping, an accountant named Lavel (Mathieu Almaric) and from him they get the name of another and so forth until the number of kidnapped and dead bodies becomes almost absurd.
What might have been played for grisly black comedy in the original is tamped down in favour for the mystery as to why Sayoko is helping. Flashbacks give us their first chance meeting at a hospital and in the present-tense narrative, she guides Albert in what feels like a horrible treatment for his mental maladies. The odd character tics and ambivalence of Sho Aikawa’s original physics prof pushing Kagawa’s raving father made for a scary portrait of inhuman logic – like a kid playing with a bug – especially as he cycled back and forth from his day job teaching evening classes. The female version, played by Shibasaki, is even more chilling since there are no laughs – but she does cycle to and from her job with the sort of ice-cold demeanour. As one character remarks, she has the eyes of a snake.
Having already watched the first iteration of this story, there was nothing new in the plot to surprise me. The additional subplots involving a Japanese immigrant in Paris needing Sayoko’s help for depression and one involving her husband back in Japan do a little to furnish psychological understanding. However, for first-time viewer there may still be surprises while the relentlessly grim story still carries weight.
Where the film shines is in the looks department.
The general visual design for this film is more expansive and grander than the original. Sometimes visually exquisite. Kurosawa and his team shot extensively around streets, hospitals, and barns to really give a sense of place. Most eye-catching are the intriguing slow dollies and blocking that reveal themselves to be POV shots. These are great for introducing characters. Another notable visual was set in the abattoir during interrogations held by Sayoko where an amber colour scheme paints the scene. Then there is the wonderful restaging of a kidnap in the countryside that leads to nervy chase through a forest and a field, that black sleeping bag Albert and Sayoko drag looking very snake-like. Very reminiscent of a scene from the original, both passages proved so visually distinctive that they ended up as posters for their films.
Indeed, it feels like Kurosawa found a greater range of colours and scene setting than in his last Paris-set film, Daguerrotype (2016) – okay, that was a ghost movie so it had to be grey and grim.
Then there is the performance from Kou Shibasaki (psycho-killer with a smile Mitsuko in Battle Royale) who speaks French extensively in her part. The greatest part of the film’s unease, outside of the hare-brained kidnapping methodology, is figuring out what is going on inside her head. Shibasaki plays things cool, snatches of dialogue that steer people where she wants them to go while keeping everyone else at bay. This deception is only broken when she plays ditzy Japanese tourist. It’s not the scary indifference of the Aikawa character in the 1998 film but a steely determination. For anyone paying attention to her, they recognise she has a snake-like gaze and a hidden intent and we have to follow her path patiently to find out what her truth is.
