Jason Statham told me a few times in interviews over the years that he used to chose roles based on who the fight choreographer was. Whatever the quality of the film, if the fights made him look cool, that was an investment in his future.

Anybody working with stuntman and fight choreographer turned director Kensuke Sonomura would almost certainly second that bit of career advice. The guy knows what he’s doing in staging thrilling, alarming and gritty hand-to-hand combat.

He turned to directing with “Hydra,” a gangster thriller more notable for its epic throw-downs than the plot or (decent enough) acting between fights. His second feature, “Bad City” has a better script, a charismatic cast and some of the most blood-pumping/fist-bumping brawls I’ve ever seen.

It’s a star vehicle for wizened on-screen heavy and sometime director Hitoshi Ozawa, who scripted and stars in this story of Yakuza, the Korean mob and how their tentacles reach into most every corner of Kaito City.

White-haired and 60something Ozawa kicks ass and settles scores as a jailed cop released to help bring-down a mob-connected developer (Lily Franky of “Shoplifting”) who escapes justice in court one more time (Sound familiar, Amerikahitos?) and announces he’s running for mayor of this “Bad City.”

A prosecutor sets up a “team” to help disgraced Capt. Toroda mete out rough justice.

“Beating up a good guy is violence,” the captain remembers. “Beating up a bad guy is justice.”

Katsuya and Masanori Mimoto play two seasoned “violent crimes unit” cops assigned to Toroda. And inexplicably, “newby” Nohara (Akane Sakanoue), a petite slip of a thing who vomited at her first taste of Yakuza violence, is thrown in as well.

“Messages” are being sent around town, Yakuza fashion. A major gang has been decimated by the Koreans, led by Madame (Rino Kataste), who still seethes over the murder of her son and heir, overseen by a top lieutenant but carried out by the seemingly unkillable Han (Tak Sakaguchi, a big deal in action cinema and a towering presence here).

Madame “hates” the Japanese, even though she lives and makes her dirty living there. Hey, she’s Korean. They have their reasons.

How all this ties in to the mob-connected developer is never all that clear. But from the opening moments, when Han dons a disposable rain slicker so that he can slice and stab two mob guards so fast they never know what hits them, to the captain’s brassy march into a mob stronghold, weilding only a bullhorn — which he uses to berate and then beat the hell out of youthful, armed and DIY-armored (thick catalogs duct-taped to their chests) Yakuza wearing baseball uniforms, the action here is pulse-pounding and personal.

Yes, that’s kind of an homage to “The Warriors.”

The fights are savage but can feel survivable, as guns are often eschewed. If you know what you’re doing with a blade, your feet and fists and body positioning, you could do all right — even if you’re “too old for this s–t,” or a Japanese Junior Miss.

The struggles feel desperate, improvised and furious and they are a jaw-dropping marvel.

Pulpy as the plot is, with an ending that adds an anti-climax or two, “Bad City” is a definite step up from “Hydra.”

If there are aspiring Jason Stathams out there from Britain, Hollywood, Hong Kong, Hokaido, Jakarta or Mumbai, this Sonomura fellow is the Man of Action you want to find an excuse to work with. And if that means a paid vacay in Japan, battling tattoo-covered gangsters by the dozen. so much the better.

Rating: unrated, violent as all get-out

Cast: Hitoshi Ozawa, Akane Sakanoue, Katsuya, Masanori Mimoto, Lily Franky, Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, Tak Sakaguchi and Rino Katase.

Credits: Directed by Kensuke Sonomura, scripted by Hitoshi Ozawa. A Well Go USA release.

Running time: 1:57