The scene is all too familiar. Two men on their knees in orange jumpsuits as a murderer looms behind them out of the anonymous tan sandscape somewhere in the Middle East.
But there is a subtle message buried beneath the latest demands from the death cult.
The black-clad killer with a London accent says Japan has 72 hours to pay $200m (€173m), $100m each, for the hostages in response to Tokyo's pledge of $200m to the coalition fighting so-called Islamic State.
The "foolish" decision has resulted in the death threat against Haruna Yukawa, who described himself as a security consultant, and the journalist Kenji Goto Jogo.
They were kidnapped months ago. Mr Yukawa was abducted while carrying a gun and immediately accused of spying.
The truth is less glamorous and less dangerous for him. He was a bankrupt widower who went to Syria to seek adventure and a second chance, his friends and family have said.
None of these details will save their lives. It is conceivable that Japan may pay to have its citizens released. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe did not comment either way, but insisted that the priority was the preservation of their lives.
But it's not money that Islamic State wants. It's self-funding, with oil revenues of $1m a day added to the $400m (€346m) it stole from Mosul's central bank last year and the $8m (€6.9m) a month it collects in taxes in Mosul alone.
Islamic State wants to talk.
It wants to be addressed, albeit as a enemy, as a nation, as the "caliphate" it claims to be.
"With some of the hostages it's had in the past, you've seen them negotiate with some governments that have paid for some citizens to get them out," said Shiraz Maher, an expert on Islamic State at King's College, London
"And that has given IS not just much-needed cash but a sense of validation that yes, we are a state, we hold meetings and conduct affairs with other states and other heads of state."
This is the cult's weakness.
Al Qaeda has been hard to crush because it is mostly an idea. It is a franchise and is playing the long game.
Its followers dream of a return to the caliphate that extended from Spain to Persia, as some distant ideal, a long way off in time.
Islamic State want heaven on earth in the here and now. It has claimed it is a state already, it has minted coins (though trades in the dollar of the Great Satan). It has a health service and schools.
All this takes money and trade to sustain.
And being an actual thing, on the ground, rather than a notion or condition of the mind means that it can be found and destroyed.
It is about to add Japan to those real nations that want to wipe it out.
