An American man returns to a corrupt, Japanese-occupied Shanghai four months before Pearl Harbor and discovers his friend has been killed. While he unravels the mysteries of the death, he falls in love and discovers a much larger secret that his own government is hiding.
After the assassination of Tokyo's Governor by Yakuza members, the CIA bureau chief (William Atherton) for Tokyo puts out a call to an agent (Steven Seagal) that had been raised in Japan and trained by ex-Yakuza. Using his former ties, he quickly determines that a war is brewing between old-guard Yakuza members and a young, crazed leader (Takao Osawa) with ties to the Chinese Tong.
Bumbling private detective Chan Tam is enlisted by police pal Fung Chak to help in the investigation of a serial murder case. The victims a middle-aged man killed at home, a dead woman found in the trash dump, and a teenage girl slain in the park were all killed in grisly manners, but they didn't seem related to one another. With no clue to follow up on, Tam is decidedly at his wits' end.
