Movies
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
Wide Releases
Now In Theaters
76
(500) Days of Summer
60
9
17
All About Steve
37
Amelia
53
Astro Boy
66
Bandslam
45
Box, The
61
Capitalism: A Love Story
55
Christmas Carol, A
43
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
66
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
29
Collector, The
23
Couples Retreat
80
District 9
61
Extract
39
Fame
30
Final Destination, The
34
Fourth Kind, The
60
Funny People
32
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra
27
Gamer
41
G-Force
39
Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard, The
46
Halloween II
73
Hangover, The
78
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
55
I Can Do Bad All By Myself
66
Informant!, The
69
Inglourious Basterds
58
Invention of Lying, The
47
Jennifer's Body
66
Julie & Julia
34
Law Abiding Citizen
33
Love Happens
54
Men Who Stare At Goats, The
67
Michael Jackson's This Is It
51
My Sister's Keeper
42
Orphan
28
Pandorum
63
Perfect Getaway, A
86
Ponyo![]()
35
Post Grad
48
Proposal, The
30
Saw VI
53
Shorts
24
Sorority Row
83
Star Trek![]()
33
Stepfather, The
45
Surrogates
55
Taking Woodstock
47
Time Traveler's Wife
96
Toy Story/Toy Story 2 3D![]()
35
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
28
Ugly Truth, The
88
Up![]()
71
Where the Wild Things Are
67
Whip It
28
Whiteout
73
Zombieland
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Limited Releases
Now In Theaters
58
(Untitled)
96
35 Shots of Rum![]()
56
Adam
72
Adela
39
Adventures of Power
78
Afghan Star
61
After the Storm
66
Afterschool
xx
All the Best
58
American Casino
72
Amreeka
48
Antichrist
73
Araya
62
Art & Copy
55
As Seen Through These Eyes
76
Baader Meinhof Complex, The
86
Beaches of Agnes, The![]()
13
Beautiful Life, A
70
Beeswax
35
Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
71
Big Fan
66
Black Dynamite
51
Blind Date
xx
Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly
76
Bliss
35
Blue Tooth Virgin, The
26
Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
57
Boys Are Back, The
45
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
81
Bright Star![]()
70
Bronson
45
Burning Plain, The
xx
Carriers
55
Casi Divas
57
Chelsea on the Rocks
62
Cloud 9
65
Coco Before Chanel
69
Cold Souls
59
Collapse
44
Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
82
Cove, The![]()
75
Crude
82
Damned United, The![]()
67
Departures
xx
Dil Bole Hadippa
71
Disgrace
xx
Do Knot Disturb
70
Earth Days
24
Eating Out 3: All You Can Eat
85
Education, An![]()
55
Endgame
xx
Eulogy for a Vampire
xx
Everyone Else
xx
Fatal Promises
56
Fifty Dead Men Walking
62
Five Minutes of Heaven
74
Flame & Citron
49
Food Beware: The French Organic Revolution
80
Food, Inc.
28
Free Style
xx
From Mexico with Love
50
Fuel
25
Gentlemen Broncos
50
Give Me Your Hand
58
Gogol Bordello Non-Stop
72
Good Hair
89
Goodbye Solo![]()
52
Grace
64
Harmony and Me
81
Headless Woman, The![]()
xx
Heretics, The
63
Horse Boy, The
73
House of the Devil, The
xx
How to Seduce Difficult Women
74
Humpday
94
Hurt Locker, The![]()
29
I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
16
If One Thing Matters: A Film About Wolfgang Tillmans
75
In Search of Beethoven
83
In the Loop![]()
61
Intimate Enemies
42
Irene in Time
70
It Might Get Loud
46
Killing Kasztner
19
Labor Day
xx
Laila's Birthday
41
Little Ashes
41
Little Traitor, The
66
Liverpool
34
Looking for Palladin
80
Lorna's Silence
83
Maid, The![]()
xx
Ministers, The
59
More Than a Game
67
Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
34
Motherhood
62
My One and Only
xx
Mystery Team
48
New York, I Love You
73
Night and Day
66
No Impact Man
47
Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
34
Other Man, The
xx
Painter Sam Francis, The
54
Paper Heart
xx
Paradise
68
Paranormal Activity
68
Paris
44
Peter and Vandy
35
Play the Game
77
Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
xx
Pretty Ugly People
65
Providence Effect, The
76
Rembrandt's J'accuse
69
September Issue, The
79
Serious Man, A
40
Shrink
61
Skin
77
Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A
xx
Skiptracers
46
Splinterheads
39
St. Trinian's
89
Still Walking![]()
50
Stoning of Soraya M., The
55
Storm
65
Tetro
70
That Evening Sun
72
Thirst
xx
Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (re-release)
61
Trucker
xx
Turning Green
83
U2 3D![]()
66
Unmade Beds
66
Unmistaken Child
70
Visual Acoustics
55
Walt & El Grupo
67
Way We Get By, The
69
We Live in Public
64
Wedding Song, The
64
Where is Where?
xx
White on Rice
74
Woman in Berlin, A
69
World's Greatest Dad
70
Yes Men Fix the World
69
Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg
xx
You, the Living
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
Brother
EMAILPRINTSony Pictures Classics

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 23 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 7 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Suspense/Thriller
Written by: Takeshi Kitano
Directed by: Takeshi Kitano
Release Date:
Theatrical: July 20, 2001
DVD: January 2, 2002
Running Time: 113 minutes, Color
Origin: UK / USA / France / Japan
Summary
RATING: R for pervasive strong violence, language and brief nudity
Starring Takeshi Kitano, Omar Epps, Kuroudo Maki, and Masaya Kato
The story of a Yakuza warrior who introduces the code of honor and discipline into the L.A. criminal world. (Sony Pictures Classics)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Dolls Kikujiro The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Village Voice J. Hoberman
If nothing else, Brother confirms Kitano's stature as the most original purveyor of on-screen mayhem since Sam Peckinpah.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
It's a romantic fantasy of the gangster brotherhood and their doomed lives, executed with Takeshi's unique mix of stoic ruthlessness and giddy energy.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Kitano's most enjoyable, flat-out fun movie, provided you can stomach the violence.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Lisa Alspector
A wizard at manipulating time, Kitano introduces staccato elements that interrupt the meditative pace even as they help set it.
Read Full Review >The New York Times A.O. Scott
Mr. Kitano directed, edited and wrote Brother -- and his style of close-to-the-vest brutality travels extremely well.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Manohla Dargis
Brother is a solid return to gangster form for Kitano, who knows how to transcend the most overly familiar genre clichés without betraying the rules of engagement.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
When it works, which is often, Kitano's movie is an anthropology of the distinctions between Japanese yakuza and American gangsters.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Delivers some powerful emotional wallops alongside the chopsticks-up-the-nose violence, and manages the remarkable feat of making venerable American genre conventions seem eerily alien.
Read Full Review >Mr. Showbiz Michael Atkinson
Sags, lollygags, and blusters too much to sustain the what-the-hell momentum that Kitano achieves in his best movies.
Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Enough odd twists to be mildly interesting.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
A typical Kitano film in many ways, but not one of his best ones. Too many of the killing scenes have a casual, perfunctory tone.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Loren King
Disappointingly hollow.
Boston Globe Jay Carr
Cool killers - Kitano's stock in trade - do not necessarily make for cool movies.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Andy Klein
While Brother may be the perfect introduction for Kitano newcomers, longtime fans may find it superfluous and even a step down from the likes of Hana-Bi (1997) and Sonatine (1993).
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Bob Graham
Beat Takeshi fans wouldn't think of missing this one. Moviegoers who hate violence wouldn't be caught dead at it.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
It's rougher stuff than most would expect, though not unrewarding in its own horrific way.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Gene Seymour
While Yamamoto's bullets never miss, Kitano's attempt at tragic grandeur of "Godfather"-esque proportions misses to an almost embarrassing degree.
Read Full Review >New York Post Jonathan Foreman
Takeshi's elliptical directorial style here is overwhelmed by the script's crudeness and lack of narrative power.
Read Full Review >Variety David Rooney
The mix feels flat and the story remains a fairly banal account of underworld exploits whose emotional gears never fully engage.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Critics tend to fawn over the Japanese director-star Takeshi Kitano (a.k.a. Beat Takeshi), but am I the only one who finds his films impossible to make heads or tails of?
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
Watching this movie, you also have to ask yourself: Just how many acts of self-inflicted finger amputations do I really want to see?
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.5 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
James M gave it a7:
Certainly not one of Kitano's best, but a great film nonetheless.
Yoon Min C. gave it a 6:
Takeshi falters as did Antonioni with Zabriskie Point, his American movie. There have been many instances of non-American directors learning to make successful American films but few have translated their personal visions on American soil with much integrity. One of the few exceptions was Leone with Once Upon a Time in the West but he was working with myth. Takeshi's story, which is set in contemporary L.A., has to be judged substantially on its understanding of the underworld of American crime; Takeshi, after all, is not just a hack churning out formulaic drivel but a noted auteur with ruthless insight into Japanese culture in his nihilistic crime-centered films. Granted, his Japanese films haven't been exactly realistic but the spirit felt true, and the inhibited, hierarchical world of japanese behavior well-suited Takeshi's minimalist formalism. In Brother Takeshi frames the more subtle and expressive American style of relationships within the Japanese mold and while the results are fascinating and peculiar, it's too far from reality to rise above absurdist comedy. But, Japanese ways are also misrepresented here. Obviously self-conscious of making a Yakuza film in America partly for American audience, Takeshi's presentation of Yakuza codes has the look of self-imposed exoticism. It's Takeshi looking at his Japan thru what he perceives might be thru American eyes. What was ruthlessly and efficiently portrayed in Takeshi's Japanese films might strike the viewer as somewhat inflated and turgid in Brother. Still, this is Takesh's most ambitious movie to date, an undertaking that took some degree of courage, vision, and daring. Sometimes one's not sure how much of this was meant in earnest or as parody. For example, smalltime 'gangsta' style hoodlums in LA becoming drugkingpins in suits overnight evoked the much discussed notion that lazy and stupid Americans should emulate the more organized and disciplined Japanese to regain economic predominance in the late 80s. Whatever its faults, the movie's bitter fatalism and tragic nihilism is pure Kitano.
Jack D. gave it an 8:
Clunky but with several great scences. Underneath the non-stop violence, there's a subtext about race relations.
Michael F. gave it a 5:
The film starts off horribly and gets better but not by much. The only thing about this film that saved it was Kitano's excellent use of violence. The film constantly attempts to be an America indie. The movie is stupid but you can have some fun with it's stylized violence.
