Visitor Q Blu-ray Review

Radiance Films

Blu-ray Release: October 20, 2026

Video: 1:33:1/1080i (480i source format)/Color

Audio: Japanese LPCM 2.0 stereo

Subtitles: English

Run Time: 84:11

Director: Takashi Miike

Note: I am recycling some of Audition (1999) 4K UHD review for the introductory paragraphs of this review.

A struggling news reporter named Kiyoshi (Kenicho Endo) keeps pushing boundaries to impress his superiors, finally winding up in a motel room with his estranged daughter (Fujiko). Back home, his bullied son (Jun Mutō) takes his violent rages out on his mother, who turns to heroin to cope, but must prostitute herself to afford the habit. Into this scene of severe family dysfunction steps Q (Kazushi Watanabe), a mysterious stranger with a knack for knowing just what each member needs most, whether it's a rock to the head, a sexual reawakening, or a bout of murder. (From Radiance’s official synopsis)

Having made a living as a working-class filmmaker in Japan since 1991, Takashi Miike initially directed whatever scripts he was handed. In interviews, he’s incredibly modest about his creative talents during retrospective interviews, stating that he didn’t even originally want to be a director – it was simply the most viable career choice. It was this uncharacteristic lack of artistic pretension that left Miike free to make uniquely intuitive and subversive motion pictures.

Initially ignored in his home country, a growing number of international fans were delighted to learn that this ‘newly discovered’ talent had already churned out dozens of films. The two that came to define him as a filmmaker were the impossibly violent, sadomasochist-themed yakuza feature, Ichi the Killer (Japanese: Koroshiya 1, 2001; based on the manga by Hideo Yamamoto), and his initial international breakthrough, Audition (Japanese: Ōdishon, 1999). 

Miike’s playful side (something that served him well in the last decade or so) was first seen by general audiences when he released Visitor Q (Japanese: Bizhitā Kyū)* and The Happiness of the Katakuris (Japanese: Katakuri-ke no kōfuku), alongside Ichi the Killer in 2001. Visitor Q and Happiness of the Katakuris subvert the popular concept of the Japanese family unit. Despite these broad similarities, they’re otherwise very different movies. Happiness of the Katakuris is an absurdist, sweet-natured musical comedy, steeped in nostalgia, while Visitor Q is a brazenly confrontational exercise in anti-erotica that matches the agitator ethos of Miike’s sneeringly nihilistic yakuza canon, just minus (most of) the graphic violence. 

Visitor Q is also unique among Miike’s movies for its aesthetic. It wasn’t the first time he shot something digitally for the V-cinema market, but it was his first (only?) mockumentary/found footage film – a stylistic choice that disorients the viewer and reinforces themes of voyeurism, while justifying the grimy look of cost-effective digital photography (the estimated budget was a paltry $70k). Miike doesn’t stick strictly to the subjective camera format – the majority of shots are taken from an objective point-of-view – but characters also speak directly to the viewer throughout, acknowledging the artifice and further implicating the audience in the various transgressions.

Visitor Q is not my personal favorite of Miike’s films. It’s an unpleasant and distressingly vulnerable viewing experience. Nevertheless, this feel-bad comedy is required viewing for anyone hoping to understand the director’s ideology at the onset of his career explosion. 

* Visitor Q was the final part of a six-part V-cinema series of otherwise unrelated films entitled Love Cinema. The other entries include Ryuichi Hiroki’s Tokyo Trash Baby (2000), Mitsuhiro Mihara’s Amen, Somen and Rugger Men! (2000), Isao Yukisada’s Enclosed Pain (2000),Tetsuo Shinohara’s Stake Out (2001), and Akihiko Shiota’s Gips (2001).

Bibliography:

• Agitator: The Cinema of Takashi Miike by Tom Mes (FAB Press, 2003)

Video

Visitor Q made its North American DVD debut from Media Blasters, though convincing bootlegs of the Tartan UK disc were also all over the market. It made its Blu-ray debut in Australia via New Wave Video earlier this year and I had assumed that Radiance was utilizing the same 1080i, 1.33:1 transfer, but just learned that New Wave’s disc apparently has a different frame rate (via DVDCompare.com). It’s important to note that Miike shot Visitor Q using a Sony DCR-VX1000, the same camera Lars von Trier used for The Idiots (1998) and Spike Lee used for Bamboozled (2000). It’s a MiniDV format camera with a maximum 480i/60Hz resolution.

The upscaled transfer was mastered from the original master beta tape, which gives everything a slight clarity and color boost without compromising the intended look. Details are soft, the harsher whites bloom, and there are plenty of format-based artifacts, including chromatic aberration and moire effects. Some of the darker edges are jagged and there’s significant color bleeding throughout. This is a technically uncut version of the film, though genitals and some pubic hair has been blurred, in accordance with the Japanese censorship laws of the era.

Audio

Visitor Q is presented in its original Japanese and uncompressed LPCM 2.0 stereo. The lo-fi imagery is matched by simple digital sound. Dialogue alternates between clean and muffled, depending on the camera placement and there’s quite a bit of room noise, especially during POV shots. There are still some outstanding moments, such as the bullies’ regular fireworks attacks on the household. There isn’t a lot of music, diegetic or otherwise (nor is there much dialogue, for that matter), outside of a simple shamisen riff from composer Koji Endo and an eerily beautiful end credit song, “Bubbles of Water,” performed by Real Time.

Extras

• Commentary with Tom Mes – Miike biographer explores the making-of and release of Visitor Q, how it fits within the director’s filmography, the use of digital video, subtext and themes, and the wider careers of the cast & crew.

• Takashi Miike on Visitor Q (21:46, HD) – In the first of three Radiance-exclusive interviews, the director discusses the state of V-cinema at the time, using consumer grade digital cameras, budgetary constraints, Itaru Era’s screenplay, family themes, and working with actors.

• Kenichi Endo on Visitor Q (18:38, HD) – The lead actor chats about the challenges of making Visitor Q and his many collaborations with Miike.

• Showko Nakahara on Visitor Q (20:49, HD) – The actress (who plays a corpse for most of the movie) looks back at the film, her early V-Cinema career, and working with Miike.

• Mother's Milk: Visitor Q and the Feminine Principle (16:04, HD) – Critic, historian, and author of All the Colours of Sergio Martino (Arrow Books, 2018) Kat Ellinger closes things out by looking at the film, Miike’s wider career, and transgressive Japanese cinema in general from the perspective of masculine failure and feminine reawakening. She also brings up comparisons to Pier Paolo Pasolini’s work that I’d never considered.

• Theatrical trailer

The images on this page are taken from the Blu-ray and sized for the page. Larger versions can be viewed by clicking the images. Note that there will be some JPG compression.