Negotiator: Mashita Masayoshi

交渉人　真下正義　(こうしょうにん　ましたまさよし) or Negotiator: Mashita Masayoshi is a 2005 Japanese Action/Thriller, and is a spin-off of the highly popular 踊る大捜査線/Bayside Shakedown series. It grossed 4.2 billion yen and was the third highest grossing (domestic, fourth overall) film that year, behind Howl's Moving Castle and Pokémon: Lucario and the Mystery of Mew (with Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith at the top overall).
==Plot==
On a television screen, a video is playing of Captain Mashita after the events of the previous film as the camera zooms out, with the words "the MPD's first negotiator" being repeated three times.
One year later, on Christmas Eve, the Tokyo Transportation Railway sees an unmarked train on the tracks for a few seconds during the Christmas Eve rush until the train disappears and Chief Fumihiko Kataoka is contacted by the MPD. Simultaneously, Muroi is going over a bomb threat left on the MPD's hacked public-facing homepage by a man going by the name of "Dangan Liner", and when the bomb goes off at the time and place the threat says, Muroi tells the other men that he will have Mashita handle this and will take the blame if it fails, although the others in the meeting room are skeptical, but sends Kijima and his ground team out to find and bust the terrorist. Simultaneously, Mashita is getting ready for the case that night, and grabs his ticket for that evening with his laptop and engagement ring, though he's not able to talk down Yukino and convince her that he'll be there.
Muroi tells Mashita that he needs him to take care of this one quickly and efficiently until Kijima enters and gives Mashita a hard time. As Mashita arrives at the TTR command room, Dangan Liner is playing tricks with the TTR with a new prototype train, threatening them with allowing another metro train to crash into it and cause a lot of fatalities. The team at that station take photos of the inside of the train as best they can so the HQ room can see who's guiding it, but they only see mobile phones. He then moves the train forward just in time as the other train pulls into the station. 
Kataoka then tells Mashita that he's not needed, and that his bosses call the cops for anything and everything. The CIC group gets set up in a small break room, ready to process data and handle the investigation. Yano then introduces himself as the head of Public Relations, and tells them about the Spider and that it's a battery powered prototype train that can change the width of its wheels, allowing it to run on all rail lines. Yano tells them about how a single collision especially on a busy day like this could cause a chain reaction of collisions, with a lot more collateral damage than just the trains. 
While a team gets into the computer system to get the ATO back online, Kijima calls the CIC team to ask them if they've found anything yet, to no avail. Kijima then guarantees two more bombs, with each one getting progressively larger, though says it's just a hunch. Dangan Liner then continues his games and threatens to crash the Spider into another train, with the Spider very quickly gaining on the other train. DGL then calls the TTR control room again, and Mashita asks him politely to slow it down and then they can talk. He does so, and then when DGL says that Mashita should know why he's doing this, Mashita hangs up. Kataoka berates him for hanging up when he should be figuring out how to get DGL off his tracks and find out what he wants, but Mashita tells him that he needs to call the shots.
The Spider then goes off on the side-lines, but Kataoka refuses to tell Mashita, and Mashita gets back to his work. Kumazawa, the line drawer, then joins the control room to start drawing up new timetables for the trains to get everything back in order. As Kijima goes to track down DGL, Mashita tells him that they have 90 companies to search through and it would take them multiple hours to track down anyone that might be missing, but Kijima tells them they have one. Mashita discusses the fact that the room went silent when the Spider disappears, to which Yano says that he can't say, but Mashita manages to get Yano to tell him a little. 
The SAT team prepares to fire on the train when it appears at Nagatacho, but DGL calls him and tells him about a bomb threat thriller movie (namely Juggernaut (1974)), to which Mashita tells Kijima at the last moment that he thinks there might be a bomb aboard the Spider. They pull back, but then a bomb goes off on a different train in a rail yard. DGL calls back and tells him that he never said it was aboard the Spider specifically. Once DGL hangs up again, Kataoka yells at Mashita that his rail yard is in ruins while the two of them play a mind game with each other, saying Mashita is the same sort of person as DGL. Kijima then does car inspections at Shiba Park, but neglects to check the package van, commenting that it would be a silly proposition.
The Spider disappears and re-appears on another line higher up than the previous one, and Mashita asks him about the "side-lines" to which Kataoka vehemently opposes there being any such thing. Kumazawa then gives him a few of the "side lines", and tells him that Kataoka isn't a bad guy, he's just got a lot on his plate. Kataoka then draws out the rest so they can figure out how to catch the Spider, and tells Mashita that he has a date that night for the Symphony. He then tells them that it's with his mother, and the room goes silent, with only Yano laughing. The SAT team then checks as many lines as it can, while Kijima realizes that the package delivery truck he let leave Shiba Park earlier was the guy they were after. Kataoka's mother then calls him and lets him know that if he's not showing up that she's leaving, while Yukino shows up to wait for Mashita.
Dangan Liner calls again, this time asking about The Odessa File, but saying that between movies and subways, he prefers subways more. As Kijima patrols the streets, the crew at TTR HQ clean up the voice clip and figure out that DG Liner also means "Digital Global Liner", the previous employer of DGL. Kijima heads to the location of the company, but finds it deserted and empty, realizing that the company went belly-up long ago. DGL calls again and Kijima tells him to mention "Yoyogi" to shake him up, but DGL is more focused on tormenting Mashita. Mashita yells at him after DGL calls him a rat, and gives him the first clue he needs, 335.2.
After some back and forth between Kijima and Mashita, DGL calls again and gives another clue, this time two composers, "Michel Legrand and Francis Lai". Mashita figures out that they worked together on Bolero, and a cake he calls "The Bolero" arrives just at that time. After they figure out that DGL wants Mashita out at the hall so he can blow it up and win the game, the cookie that reads "Merry Christmas" reads Mashita's seat number. He taunts Mashita once more about how he has to go save his girlfriend from getting killed and when Mashita gets angry again, he gives his final clue. "Midnight Plus One", a novel that was never turned into a movie, Mashita asks that once he figures out this clue DGL deactivates the bomb, to which he laughs at Mashita for.
They figure out the "Plus One" is referring to the currently under construction Line 14, and that's how he's going to get the Spider to Shinjuku to blow up the hall. Mashita then heads out to the hall to save Yukino as the SAT team dispatches to Line 14 and the bomb squad dispatches to the symphony hall. On his way there, they figure out that the 335.2 clue refers to the second beat of the 335th measure of Bolero, which the cymbals play. Kijima arrives at the hall to prepare to pull the cymbal player before he can play them, and the bomb squad chief brings up Juggernaut again, referencing that it came down to a red wire and a blue wire. The CIC room at the TTR HQ finds out that DGL is a man named Yuchi Hada from the voice clips, but finds out that he was confirmed deceased 8 years ago. As DGL calls again, Mashita manages to con DGL into telling him that he's on Line 14 by using reverse psychology. Just in time, Mayida tells the other man to "cut the red wire" and Kijima pulls the cymbal player. As the audience applauds, the SAT team fires at the Spider, disabling it, and DGL is left defeated.
Mashita goes outside to see DGL pulling out of the parking garage and chases, with DGL speeding up and slowing down to mock him. He then speeds away and detonates the bomb in his van, killing himself and destroying any remaining evidence. Later, everyone relaxes and Mashita tries again to propose to Yukino, failing in a similar manner to the previous film by pulling out old photos of Yukino when he meant to grab the engagement ring in the other pocket. He pulls it out and opens it, but then Kijima startles him, causing the ring to fly out and them all having to scour the ground for the now fallen ring.
==Cast==
*Yusuke Santamaria as Chief Negotiator Masayoshi Mashita
*Miki Mizuno as Officer Yukino Kashiwagi
*Susumu Terajima as Joichiro Kijima
*Wataru Takasugi as Chu Kusakabe
*Jun Kunimura as Fumuhiko Kataoka
*Masanori Ishii as Kimi'ichi Yano
*Toshiro Yanagiba as Shinji Muroi
*Yutaka Matsuhige as Mayida Katsuhige
*Kaoru Yachigusa as Tomoyo Kataoka (Fumihiko's mother)
==Trivia==
*The side lines that are treated as a secret actually are public knowledge in Japan. They are non-commercial tracks and are used for moving vehicles across the same gauge of line or when event trains are being operated.
*Temporary metro timetables are made in case of some emergencies, so a timetable specialist is not always called in case revisions are required.
Category:2005 films
Category:Japanese films
Category:Action films
Category:Thriller films