Tetsuo: The Iron Man
Tetsuo: The Iron Man is a 1989 film from Japan, directed by Shinya Tsukamoto, running 67 minutes. reelscum files it under splatter and body horror.
- Year
- 1989 · 1980s films
- Country
- Japan
- Runtime
- 67 min
- Director
- Shinya Tsukamoto
- Updated
- 10 Aug 2026
- Obscurity
- known (25/100)
- Also known as
- Tetsuo: The Ironman
Defined in the glossary: Splatter, Body horror
Sixty-seven minutes of industrial nightmare. Nothing else looks like it.
Sixty-seven minutes of industrial nightmare, and nothing else on this site looks like it. A Tokyo salaryman begins mutating into a mass of scrap metal, and Shinya Tsukamoto films the transformation as a black-and-white assault of stop-motion, strobe and shrieking noise. Narrative is almost beside the point.
It plays like a Cronenberg body-horror crossed with a Nine Inch Nails video made by hand, relentless and disorienting. Tsukamoto did nearly everything himself, and you can feel the obsession in every frame.
Not for everyone, and unforgettable for the people it is for.
Trailer
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Where to watch
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