ELECTRIC DRAGON 80,000 VOLTS

Director Ishii Sogo / 2000 / Japan

Playing by a high-voltage power pylon as a child, Dragon Eye Morrison receives a massive electric shock. Rather than terminate his young life, the charge ignites a long dormant, prehistoric predisposition for blind rage in his brain. Morrison's dragon has been awakened. Scientists try vainly to calm the boy with years of electro-convulsive therapy to no avail.

Now grown, Dragon Eye makes a living tracking lost lizards. His altered brain chemistry has granted him special abilities enabling near telepathic communication with reptiles. He finds solace playing raucous, noise and feedback-drenched guitar. As a consequence he must shackle himself to his bed every night to avoid his mental disturbances sending wavers of electromagnetic turbulence cascading over his urban environment.

Thunderbolt Buddha, a rival to Dragon Eye appears on the scene. Struck by lightening as a youngster, he is possessed of similar powers but assumes superiority to Dragon Eye. A fatal confrontation follows as the pair meet for a supercharged showdown on a Tokyo rooftop.

Recalling the biomechanoid sci-fi mayhem of Shinya Tsukamoto's Tetsuo films, Ishii takes an aberrant medical condition, a pounding industrial beat and adds a titanic struggle for supremacy. His latest film combines outrageous visual impact with hallucinogenic fantasy.

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