Horror anthologies are always fairly interesting projects I think, because you never quite know what you’re going to get – one story might be genuinely creepy, the next might be completely bonkers, and then the third suddenly turns into something much darker than you expected – Kaiki Taxi: To Those Who Do Not Know the Decree looks like it was made with exactly that sort of attitude.
It’s based on the Kaiki Taxi manga by yokai artist Tatsuya Morino, and the whole thing is built around a mysterious taxi driver called Takuro Kaiki, who takes passengers into a world where the line between everyday life and the supernatural starts getting very thin.
The film opened in Japanese cinemas on July 24, 2026, and runs for around 110 minutes, and no, I don’t think I’d be getting into that taxi.
The Driver Knows Where You’re Going
The strange thing about Takuro Kaiki is that he isn’t really the traditional horror villain, as he’s more of a guide, where his black taxi appears through the night fog, apparently carrying people towards three separate stories where things get increasingly unpleasant – the film is structured as an anthology, with a short prologue followed by “The Cannibal Car of the Curve,” “Illegal Parking Critic” and “Mystery Tour.”
The first story follows a television crew investigating rumours about a dangerous mountain curve where couples have been involved in bizarre accidents.
The second is about Eriko Yamasaki, a popular lifestyle commentator whose husband died after an illegally parked car caused a traffic jam that delayed the ambulance, where she later agrees to give a talk about illegal parking, only for someone in the audience to start asking some very uncomfortable questions.
Then there’s “Mystery Tour,” which follows Shuichi Ikiki, a man hiding a secret who receives a special invitation to a mysterious bus tour.
I particularly like that the stories aren’t all variations on ghost appears, everyone screams – the film moves between urban legend, supernatural horror and human nastiness, which should hopefully keep the anthology from becoming repetitive.
Trailer
Hideo Okamoto Brings the Manga to the Screen
Hideo Okamoto directs and writes the film, adapting Tatsuya Morino’s Kaiki Taxi manga – Okamoto has worked across special effects and anime, and also wrote the earlier live-action Kaiki Taxi film Kaiki Taxi: Watch Out for the Windy Night Road! before taking the director’s chair for this one.
The cast is also huge because of the anthology format.
Yui Okada, Taisei Kido, Yu Uemura, Taisuke Niihara and Tsubaki Oniyakko appear in the first story, while Koji Matoba, Emiri Nakayama, Taiyo Sugiura, Seiji Chihara and Ayaka Umeda feature in the second.
The third story stars Tatsuya Nagayama, Makoto Ogawa, Shinji Rokkaku and Diamond Yukai, while Masakatsu Iwata and several others appear in the prologue.
Iwata is also the film’s producer and plays a role in the mysterious taxi framework that connects the stories.
The Manga Comes From a Yokai Artist
The original Kaiki Taxi comes from Tatsuya Morino, a manga artist known for his work with yokai and supernatural subjects – Morino studied under legendary manga creator Shigeru Mizuki, which is a pretty significant connection if you’re interested in Japanese folklore and monster storytelling, and that background makes more sense when you look at the film.
This isn’t simply trying to copy the look of modern J-horror, as there’s more of a kaidan and yokai-storytelling flavour to the premise, where strange things happen in ordinary places and the supernatural can appear almost casually.
The taxi driver is particularly suited to that, as he’s less like the killer in a slasher and more like one of those mysterious figures in an old folktale who turns up, offers you a choice and leaves you wondering whether you should have listened to him.
Except he’s driving a taxi.
The Three Stories Get Very Different
“The Cannibal Car of the Curve” is probably the most immediately recognisable horror story of the three – abeautiful viewpoint, a dangerous bend in the road and mysterious accidents involving couples. It’s basically the sort of urban legend you can imagine being passed around by teenagers who have absolutely no intention of actually driving up there themselves.
Then “Illegal Parking Critic” goes in a much more human direction – the horror begins with something completely ordinary – illegal parking – and then turns into something considerably nastier once the consequences of that incident come back.
Finally, “Mystery Tour” sounds like the strangest of the three.
A man with a secret receives a free invitation to a bus trip and decides this is somehow good news.
I don’t want to be rude, but if a mysterious company sends you a free ticket for an unexplained bus tour and you have a secret you’re desperately trying to hide, perhaps staying at home is the better option.
The connection to yokai culture is also evident here, asJapanese horror often gets reduced internationally to Ringu, Ju-On and long-haired ghosts crawling out of places they shouldn’t be crawling out of.
I love those films, but there’s a much older tradition underneath them – Kaiki Taxi feels closer to the idea that the world is full of strange things and that ordinary people can accidentally wander into them.
There’s Also Quite a Bit of “People Are Awful”
One thing the filmmakers have emphasised is that the movie isn’t purely about ghosts and monsters – the three stories deliberately move across occult horror, urban legends and human horror, with people’s own behaviour often contributing to what happens to them.
That should suit an anthology format because you don’t need every segment to follow exactly the same rules.
One can be supernatural.
Another can be almost entirely about human behaviour.
Another can sit somewhere in between.
Personally, I prefer that to an anthology where every segment is basically The same ghost, different wallpaper.
The film was produced in Japan and filmed across locations including Tokyo, Saitama and Hiroshima, with TALOS and Forble involved in production. MF Pictures is handling distribution, and I actually think the relatively modest production background suits it, as this doesn’t look like a film that needs enormous effects budgets.
I’m More Interested in the Weird Stuff
The thing that makes me want to watch Kaiki Taxi isn’t really the taxi itself, it’s the fact that the film seems happy to bounce between different kinds of horror – the first story sounds like an urban legend, the second sounds closer to human horror with supernatural consequences and the third sounds like a full-on nightmare.
That gives me more confidence than another anthology where the trailer shows everything in the first thirty seconds and then there’s nowhere left to go – I also like the Tatsuya Morino connection. Knowing that the source comes from someone steeped in yokai storytelling gives the film a bit more personality than a generic “mysterious taxi driver” concept might suggest.
I haven’t seen enough to say which segment is going to be the best, and with anthologies there’s always the danger that one great story gets stuck between two that don’t quite work, but that’s also part of the fun.
If I get one genuinely creepy story, one completely ridiculous one and another that leaves me sitting there thinking what the hell did I just watch?, I’ll probably be quite happy.
And as for Takuro Kaiki, I’ll let him keep driving.
I’m walking.
Check out these other Japanese horror movies too.
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