Wednesday, Feb. 5, the PFS salutes charismatic and odd Japanese leading man Joe Shishido, who recently passed away at the age of 86 after enjoying decades of cult stardom among fans of peculiar foreign cinema. Known for both his surgically enhanced cheekbones (no, seriously) and for his roles in a handful of somewhat avant-garde comedic crime flicks from the 1960s, he is perhaps best loved for his portrayal of the main protagonist in director Seijun Suzuki’s bonkers take on the hard-boiled hitman genre, 1967’s B&W masterpiece of inscrutability “Branded To Kill!”, in which Shishido plays a contract killer on an almost absurdly ridiculous mission.

Hilarious, thrilling and perplexing all at once, “Branded To Kill!” brazenly thumbed its nose at established norms of linear storytelling and logical plot and character development, with the result being a bizarre, sexy action flick that’s as hard to follow as it is impossible to ignore.

In fact, it was so odd and ahead of its time that the studio who financed it (Nikkatsu) reportedly terminated the director’s longstanding contract immediately afterward! The PFS will screen the full, uncut version of this feature in the original spoken Japanese, with English subtitles. 8 p.m. showtime.