Cold Fish

Cold Fish (冷たい熱帯魚, 2011) is a Japanese thriller from director Sion Sono — watch online on iFILM. Mitsuru Fukikoshi plays Shamoto, a meek tropical-fish shop owner who cannot refuse anyone: not his shoplifting teenage daughter, not his indifferent second wife, and certainly not the man he is about to meet.

That man is Murata, played with terrifying warmth by Denden. He's gregarious and generous — he catches Shamoto's daughter stealing and quietly makes the problem disappear, then offers her a job at his own chain of exotic fish stores. Shamoto feels grateful, then obligated, then trapped. The film draws on the real Saitama serial murder case from the early 1990s, and Sono holds nothing back about what that actually looked like.

At 146 minutes, Cold Fish does not rush. It lets you understand exactly how Shamoto got here before it shows you where he ends up. Wrenching and relentless, this is horror built from ordinary passivity. Stream Cold Fish online on iFILM.