Santoshi, a debt-ridden widower, seeks the bounty for the capture of a wanted serial killer. But when he suddenly disappears himself, it is up to his daughter to track down her missing father. The initially straightforward detective story turns into a complex study of what a desperate man is capable of under the pressure of poverty. Full of plot twists, the film makes no effort to hide its inspiration from Oscar-winning Korean filmmaker Bong Joon Ho’s work, on two of whose projects Shinzo Katayama worked as an assistant director.

Shinzo Katayama

The Japanese director and screenwriter made his international debut in 2019 with Siblings of the Cape (2018), screened at Taipei, Geneva, and Goteborg festivals. He continues to tell the shocking stories of characters who are forced to cross their moral boundaries due to financial hardship in the subversive thriller Missing, presented at the Busan IFF.