Prolific Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike has taken control of one of cinema’s strangest crime franchises. NEON has released the official teaser trailer for Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo, unleashing Shun Oguri as a disgraced detective spiralling through corruption, addiction and violence, with Lily James stepping into the chaos as an enigmatic FBI agent. Watch the teaser above and read on for what to know.
Shun Oguri Is Tokyo’s New Bad Lieutenant
Oguri plays a compulsive gambler whose latest case brings an enigmatic FBI agent to Tokyo. Played by James, she is searching for the missing daughter of a powerful American family and soon finds herself pulled into the detective’s increasingly dangerous world.
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That missing woman is played by WWE star Liv Morgan. The investigation also involves a vengeful former yakuza and a mysterious killer, giving Oguri’s detective plenty of opportunities to make an already disastrous situation even worse.
The teaser keeps the finer plot details deliberately murky, instead delivering a rapid-fire taste of Miike’s lurid approach. There are crowded nightclubs, gunfire, blood, violent confrontations and enough questionable behaviour to confirm that, yes, this member of law enforcement is every bit as unhinged as the title suggests. The badge is clearly doing very little to keep him on the right side of anything.
The Strangest Crime Franchise Returns
Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo is the third instalment in a franchise that has never shown much interest in conventional continuity. The series began with Abel Ferrara’s uncompromising 1992 crime drama Bad Lieutenant, starring Harvey Keitel as an unnamed, drug-addicted NYPD officer sinking beneath the weight of his corruption, violence and Catholic guilt.
Seventeen years later, Werner Herzog and Nicolas Cage delivered Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. Although it shared the title and corrupt-cop premise, the darkly comic 2009 film introduced entirely new characters and pushed the concept in a far more surreal direction.
Now, another singular filmmaker has been handed the badge. Takashi Miike is an almost suspiciously perfect choice for the material. The director has spent decades moving between yakuza thrillers, extreme horror, samurai epics, musicals, family entertainment and just about everything in between. And films such as Audition, Ichi the Killer and 13 Assassins have shown his talent for combining savage violence with dark humour and sudden tonal shifts.
Lily James Calls the Experience a Career Highlight
James recently told The Playlist that working with Miike in Japan pushed her out of her comfort zone and forced her to rely more heavily on instinct.
“Going to Japan and being completely out of my comfort zone and working on a set where I was pretty much the only English person, so I’m working with a translator and adapting to the way that [Miike] works, which is one or two takes max. And I would say it’s a highlight of my career because it was so different.”
That speed extended to an elaborate nightclub action sequence that James believed could have taken more than a week on a major Hollywood production. Miike completed it in a single day.
“We did it in a day, and it was so crazy. But yeah, even that, it’s not a huge amount of coverage. And he shoots in such a clever way. He’s such an auteur, and he’s so specific about the angles and so experienced. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
James said the entire film was shot in approximately four weeks, with her portion completed in two. She described Miike as a filmmaker who appears to have already edited each scene in his head, allowing him to capture only the precise beats he needs.
Miike Reunites with Familiar Collaborators
The film was written by Daisuke Tengan, who previously collaborated with Miike on Audition and 13 Assassins.
Oguri also has an established history with the director, having appeared in Crows Zero, Sukiyaki Western Django and Terra Formars. James said that familiarity created a valuable shorthand on a production moving at Miike’s characteristically fast pace.
The ensemble also includes Shotaro Mamiya, Shūhei Nomura, Nanase Nishino, Yuka Kouri, Takanori Iwata, Keisuke Watanabe, Hideo Nakano, Jun Murakami, Jun Kunimura and Hiroshi Tachi.
Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo will make its world premiere at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival, which runs from September 10 to 20. NEON has not yet announced a theatrical release date and currently lists the film as coming soon.
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