[3] It is directed and co-written by Christophe Gans in his solo directorial debut and stars Mark Dacascos in the title role, a brainwashed assassin for a Triad secret society, who sheds a tear for every victim he kills.

Tchéky Karyo, Julie Condra, Byron Mann, Masaya Kato, Yoko Shimada, and Mako play supporting roles.

Despite being heavily promoted by Viz Media in Animerica magazine and reprints of the Crying Freeman graphic novel, the film was not released in the United States until November 2018 on Amazon Prime Video.

[4] While painting the landscape on a hill in San Francisco, a young woman named Emu O'Hara witnesses the murder of a Japanese Yakuza member.

Interpol detective Netah explains that the Sons of the Dragons are descendants of 108 Buddhist monks who rebelled against the Manchu reign in China centuries ago, and that the "Freeman" is their bringer of death.

As Freeman and Koh flee the scene, Emu utters Yo's name to the surprise of Detective Forge, who is assigned to protect her.

As Netah scouts the mansion's perimeters, he discovers that Forge is knocked unconscious and he encounters Ryuji and Kimie Hanada, who are out to claim the Freeman's head and take over the Hakushin Society.

Years ago, he was Yo Hinomura, a renowned pottery sculptor who stumbled upon a roll of negatives during his exhibit in New York City.

Leonard Klady of Variety wrote a favorable review of the film, citing it as "one of the few of the recent batch of comic-book adaptations that works, Crying Freeman has the potential to ring up the type of big numbers that would warrant a franchise.

"[5] Jake Hamilton of Empire magazine gave the film two out of five stars, commenting: "Adapted from Kazuo Koike's ace comic book, Crying Freeman can claim absolute perfection with its faithfulness to the original text.

There's plenty of occult talk by leather-clad blokes to up the cult appeal, and the nudity should prevent the audience from nodding off, but this $15 million kung fu fantasy really should have been better.