Lumberjack the Monster

It’s incredible that a filmmaker as renowned as Takashi Miike can have a film stealth drop on Netflix. But that’s what happens when you make as many flicks as the director of “Audition,” “13 Assassins,” and “Ichi the Killer” has helmed over his illustrious career. Seriously, there’s a very strong chance he’s on a set right now, having accumulated over 100 directorial credits as of this writing. However, Miike is more than a “stat compiler”; he’s an ace craftsman who rarely phones it in, elevating a truly clunky project like “Lumberjack the Monster” into something better than it has any right to be. The script by Hiroyoshi Koiwai doesn’t exactly hold together narratively or thematically. Still, there are Miike touches throughout “Lumberjack” that keep it entertaining, even if he’s probably made a better movie while you’re reading this.