An ambitious samurai finds himself corrupted by the times in which he lives in Fukasaku’s etherial fusion of Yotsuya Kaidan and the Chushingura
Jan 1, 2022 • Subscribe
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YOTSUYA KAIDAN 四谷怪談 (1949) + NIJI OTOKO (THE RAINBOW MAN) 虹男 (1949)
YOTSUYA KAIDAN This is one of several film versions of Tsuruya Nanboku IV’s story, Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan. Nanboku wrote this tale...
Sympathy for the Underdog (博徒外人部隊, Kinji Fukasaku, 1971)
A displaced post-war gangster relocates to Okinawa where the conditions of the occupation are stil very much in play in Fukasaku’s proto-jitsuroku yakuza drama
The Threat (脅迫, Kinji Fukasaku, 1966)
An ambitious executive is confronted with the emasculating nature of the salaryman dream when escaped convicts invade his home in an early thriller from Kinji Fukasaku.
Episode #79 (S10E8) – Kwaidan [怪談] (1965)
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Graveyard of Honor (仁義の墓場, Kinji Fukasaku, 1975)
A renegade gangster slowly implodes amid the turbulent winds of the post-war era in Kinji Fukasaku’s anarchic take on the life of Rikio Ishikawa
House on Fire (火宅の人, Kinji Fukasaku, 1986)
An anxious writer fears collapse under the weight of fatherhood in Kinji Fuksaku’s adaptation of the autobiographical novel of Kazuo Dan.
Snake Woman’s Curse (怪談蛇女, Nobuo Nakagawa, 1968)
A venal landlord is haunted by the legacy of feudal injustice in Nakagawa’s eerie Meiji-era ghost story
Motoshinkakarannu (沖縄エロス外伝 モトシンカカランヌー, NDU, 1971)
The Nihon Documentarist Union visits Okinawa on the brink of its reversion and capture a sense of anxiety of those caught at a moment of transition.
Ghost Cat of Nabeshima (鍋島怪猫伝, Kunio Watanabe, 1949)
A haunted Go board, a paranoid lord, and a rumour about a vengeful ghost cat spirit throw a small community into chaos in Kunio Watabe’s playful supernatural drama
The Ghosts of Kagami Pond (怪談鏡ケ淵, Masaki Mori, 1959)
The ambitious manager of a kimono store gets a gets a ghostly comeuppance in Masaki Mori’s B-movie kaidan
The Ghost of the Hunchback (怪談せむし男, Hajime Sato, 1965)
Morally compromised citizens of post-war Japan find themselves trapped in the purgatorial hell of a creepy old mansion in Hajime Sato’s gothic romp
The Kamikaze Guy (カミカゼ野郎 真昼の決斗, Kinji Fukasaku, 1966)
A bumbling pilot becomes embroiled in a conspiracy after an encounter on a ski slope in a goodnatured action comedy starring a young Sonny Chiba.
Japan Organized Crime Boss (日本暴力団 組長, Kinji Fukasaku, 1969)
A recently released yakuza emerges into a changed Japan in Kinji Fukasaku’s proto-jitsuroku gangster picture.
The Pledge (博奕打ち外伝, Kosaku Yamashita, 1972)
The gangster code slowly consumes series of men each trying to do the right thing but hamstrung by the actions of others in Kosaku Yamashita’s yakuza tragedy.
The Sea of Genkai (任侠外伝 玄海灘, Juro Kara, 1976)
A petty gangster finds himself confronted by the traumatic past on discovering a stowaway aboard his smuggling boat in Juro Kara’s infinitely bleak drama.
The Pit of Death / 怪談おとし穴 / Kaidan otoshiana (aka ‘The Ghostly Trap’, 1968)
Obscure Japanese Film #147 Mikio Narita Kuramoto (Mikio Narita) is an ambitious salaryman working at a company based in a tower block sa...
Yakuza Graveyard (やくざの墓場 くちなしの花, Kinji Fukasaku, 1976)
A maverick cop finds himself sympathising with noble yakuza when confronted by entrenched corruption in Kinji Fukasaku’s jitsuroku-esque gangster drama.
Gude Crest
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The Living Koheiji (怪異談 生きてゐる小平次, Nobuo Nakagawa, 1982)
An irresolvable love triangle between childhood friends seems set to echo through eternity in Nobuo Nakagawa’s haunting final feature.
Winter’s Wish Spirits of Edo Kinji Walkthrough
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Operation Plazma in Osaka (実録外伝 大阪電撃作戦, Sadao Nakajima, 1976)
An attempt at a hostile takeover from corporatised Kobe gangsters destabilises the precarious balance of post-war Osaka in Sadao Nakajima’s anarchic jitsuroku eiga.
The Tattooed Hitman (山口組外伝 九州進攻作戦, Kosaku Yamashita, 1974)
An old-school footsoldier finds himself left behind by his friend’s unstoppable rise in the realms of corporatised gangsterdom in Kosaku Yamashita’s jitsuroku gangster picture.
The Serial Betrayal of an Audience
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By Reki Kawahara and Yukiko Horiguchi. Released in Japan by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by James balzer. I had heard, for some…
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Marrine steps up her attack on Alturk. When word reaches her that Mirza has fulfilled his part of the bargain, she sits and waits. Villar, however, is busy…
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While casually browsing through Paramount’s extensive catalog, a gem from 1994 caught my eye: Fresh. Given its age, I was concerned about its relevancy, but beyond the temporal…
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The discovery of a pistol concealed under a vending machine provokes a prolonged crisis of power and masculinity in Junji Sakamoto’s tense psychological drama.
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