Serpent's Path (French: La Voie du serpent) is a 2024 thriller film directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa starring Damien Bonnard and Ko Shibasaki.
A French-language remake of Kurosawa's 1998 film of the same name, Serpent's Path screened at the 2024 San Sebastián International Film Festival.
Contents
Plot
Grieving father Albert enlists Japanese psychiatrist Sayoko to exact revenge on members of The Circle, an organ trafficking organization involved in the death of his eight-year-old daughter.
Cast
Damien Bonnard as Albert Bacheret
Ko Shibasaki as Sayoko Mijima
Mathieu Amalric as Laval
Grégoire Colin as Pierre Guérin
Hidetoshi Nishijima as Yoshimura, Sayoko's patient
Munetaka Aoki as Soichiro, Sayoko's husband
Éric Bernard as a police officer
Production
According to Kurosawa, the film originated with Cinefrance Studios' offer to remake one of his prior films in France. Kurosawa and French journalist Aurélien Ferenczi wrote the new version of the screenplay, changing the gender of the doctor role from the original screenplay by Hiroshi Takahashi. Serpent's Path was filmed on location in France in 2023, specifically in Île-de-France. Shibasaki took French lessons for six months to prepare for the role.
Release
Serpent's Path was released theatrically in Japan on 14 June 2024. The film screened in competition at the 72nd San Sebastián International Film Festival in September 2024. It was released in France on 3 September 2025.
It was also selected in Gala Presentation at the 29th Busan International Film Festival to be screened on October 4, 2024.
Reception
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 83% of 18 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7/10. Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 56 out of 100, based on 5 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.