The Rio Grind Film Festival: Top Knot Detective
The greatest 90's Japanese Samurai series you've never heard of.
The Rio Grind Film Festival: Top Knot Detective
In the early 1990’s, a little known Japanese Samurai/Detective Series was syndicated to public access TV in Australia and became a cult success. In Japan, it was titled “Ronin Suiri Tentai” (roughly translating to “Deductive Reasoning Ronin”), but soon came to be known in the West as TOP KNOT DETECTIVE. The original Japanese series was legendary in in its home country as being a cultural train-wreck, led by its insane writer/director/producer/lead actor Takashi Tawagoto. He couldn’t act. He couldn’t fight. He had no idea how to write a TV show. But, through various underworld connections, he had the money to make himself into a star… or so he thought… With Toshi Okuzaki, Masa Yamaguchi, and Mayu Iwasaki.
Thursday, November 16
Movie 9:20 pm
“TOP KNOT DETECTIVE suggests truth is stranger than fiction, but fictional truths are even stranger…. A fun, endearing look at a fictional creation, and it’s enough to make you a fan of the show that never was.” (Film School Rejects)
“Part Peter Jackson‘s FORGOTTEN SILVER, part MONKEY MAGIC, part Takashi Miike – TOP KNOT DETECTIVE is 100% hilarious.” (Belfast Film Festival)
“Brash, bold and utterly batshit, TOP KNOT DETECTIVE documents a bygone television sensation so crazy that you would be forgiven for not believing in the truth of any of it.” (Sci-fi Now)
“I want to believe TOP KNOT DETECTIVE existed, and if it doesn’t, I’m sure as hell glad Aaron McCann and Dominic Pearce created it, because it’s goddamned hysterical.” (Screen Anarchy)
TOP KNOT DETECTIVE (Aaron McCann, Dominic Pearce / 2017 / 86 mins / In English and Japanese w/ English subs) In the early 90s, a little-known Japanese Samurai/Detective series hit Australia where it quickly became a cult hit. In Japan it was called ‘Ronin Suiri Tentai’ (Deductive Reasoning Ronin) but in Australia it is know only as TOP KNOT DETCTIVE. This is the story of how a failed Japanese samurai series became an instant cult classic.
