A young woman appears to have been violently beaten by a mysterious assailant she believes to be a boy on roller-blades wielding a baseball bat. But as detectives chase the trail of the juvenile attacker, dubbed “bat boy,” uncanny connections between subsequent victims, including the detective himself, reveal the victims’ secret anxieties, in a surreal, biting critique of our urban selves. Originally made for television by the cult animated film director Kon Satoshi (Perfect Blue, Tokyo Godfathers, Paprika), this series explores the societal angst of a postwar, rapidly industrialized society, and is relatively unique in the anime genre, for its disturbing, self-reflexive insight.

The film screening will be followed by a short discussion.

This film is part of the monthly film series Asia and the Pacific Screens, sponsored by the Australian Centre on China in the World.

Director Kon Satoshi 今敏

2005, three episodes

Japanese with English subtitles