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58 year old Ichiro Inuyashiki is a down trodden loser working in sales for a company who doesn’t want him, to pay for a mortgage for his wife and kids who couldn’t care less about him. Ichiro’s life seems like it can’t get any worse, until a letter sends him to the doctor’s office, where he is told he has a terminal illness. He attempts to confide in his family, but is completely disregarded due to their disdain towards him. Upon arriving home one night, he finds a dog that was left on his door step who he so wishes to befriend, but in keeping up with his wife’s wishes tries to abandon in a park. In his attempt to discard the dog, a bright light in the sky renders him unconscious and upon awakening the next day, he begins to experience new found abilities and a new found body.

In “Inuyashiki,” an alien encounter mutates two unsuspecting charaters — one, a decrepit salaryman, the other, a neighborhood teenager — into indestructible cyborgs, but contrary to genre conventions, it’s the kid who turns evil, leaving the wussy old codger to save the day. Adapted from a manga by Hiroya Oku, this Japanese genre effort is ably directed by Shinsuke Sato, who foregrounds interpersonal relationships and human emotion over action and effects. The fact that English translations of the 10-volume series exist digitally, while an anime miniseries can be viewed on Amazon Prime Video, should boost the film’s overseas potential. Meanwhile, in a country with the world’s highest elderly population, the action movie’s anti-ageist thrust — demonstrating how undervalued senior citizens kick ass — proves unexpectedly heart-warming.

From “Parasyste” to “Gantz” (also written by Oku), Japanese science fiction is rife with stories of humans merging with androids or aliens. Of this tradition,...