Edwin Toonen

Melodrama. Melo-drama. Meeelllooodddrraamma. Not usually my cup of tea. But being a fan of classic Japanese movies and knowing about the scarcity of really old Japanese movies, I have to take what I can get. The movie of the night was therefore The Dawning Sky, directed by Torajiro Saito and made in 1929. So it’s silent, but narrated by a benshi.

Kyoko is married to a banker and has a lovely baby daughter. But when her husband dies and his bank goes bankrupt, she is all alone. The family of the husband doesn’t really like her and her father orders her to find another husband. She has to leave her baby. She thinks hard but doesn’t see another way out. She walks out and wanders, until she comes to a church. Some years later we see little girl Reiko living with her grandfather in a small village. The talk around the town is of a very nice new woman priest. Reiko is curious. Who could it be? But grandpa isn’t as happy to see Kyoko again…

The Dawning Sky isn’t particularly interesting, not because of great acting or ground breaking cinematography. It was cool to watch another silent Japanese movie because of it’s historical value. But the movie didn’t offer much in terms of quality.

Japanese title: Akeyuku sora  Director: Torajiro Saito Year: 1929 Studio: Shochiku

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

Here kitty, kitty. Japanese horror movies (kaidan) are generally not very scary, especially the old ones. A lot of them are based on old folklore tales and involve ghosts and animals of some kind. The same goes for The Haunted Castle. This movie takes place in Edo period and therefore involves lots of samurai and castles. When Lord Tangonokami Nabeshime takes a liking to the sister of a blind monk he wants to make her a concubine. Her brother the monk doesn’t like that one bit and lets the lord know she doesn’t want to. After telling the lord that and accusing the lord of cheating at a Go game, he gets cut down and dies. He is thrown into a well and that’s the end of him.

The girl is worried and doesn’t know what to do. When she receives word of the lord that she is stripped of all her posessions and banished from court, she gets very upset. Very upset, because she commits hara-kiri with a knife, but not before asking the black cat Tama to drink her blood and avenge her family as a ghost cat. He does and starts haunting the castle and stalking everyone in it.

This movie was hard for me to get into. Every time I saw the cat I had to think of ceiling cat. And that’s probably not a good image if you try to concentrate for a ‘horror’ movie. Still, this is an OK movie and probably better than most Japanese horror.

Japanese title: Hiroku kaibyô-den  Director: Tokuzô Tanaka Year: 1969 Studio: Daiei

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

I love Haruki Murakami’s books. I really love Norwegian Wood and so I was pleasantly surprised when a movie version was announced. But boy was I disappointed. Director Anh Hung Tran wrote the screenplay himself and that is probably the largest part of the problem. Too much has been hacked away and what was left in was just scattered randomly around. Not good. It could have been so good, because the acting, music and especially the cinematography were all excellent. A text book example of the book was better than the movie. Way better in this case.

Japanese title: Noruwei no mori Director: Anh Hung Tran Year: 2010 Studio: Asmik Ace

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Part 2 of the Yakuza Papers series focusses on a new and tragic character: Shoji Yamanaka. This young man gets into a lot of trouble in post war Hiroshima when he falls in love with the niece of his boss. Yamanaka is a very tragic character. Repeatedly beaten by different gang members he finally finds employment within the Muraoka clan. To show his loyalty and competence he has to kill a boss of another clan. This is the start of a violent life within the yakuza world. A life that can only end in bloodshed and death.

Hirono Shozo (Bunta Sugawara) is only a supporting character in this second movie, but we see him picking up the pieces and forming his own family. He also forms a sort of friendship with Yamanaka. Another big part is for cult hero Sonny Chiba, who plays Katsutoshi Otomo, a violent and rather crazy yakuza from the Otomo clan. His role is amusing but slightly over the top. This second part of the series is not as good as the first, but still very enjoyable. The ending, the chasing of Yamanaka through a dark and rain soaked Hiroshima is pure class and memorable.

Japanese title: Jingi naki tatakai: Hiroshima shito nen Director: Fukasaku Kinji Year: 1973 Studio: Toei

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

The Yakuza Papers is a masterful epic about the yakuza wars in post-war Hiroshima. Five films make up the series and these form the magnum opus of the prolific Japanese director Kinji Fukasaku. These films are nothing like the romanticised  gangster films we know in the West. They are extremely raw, graphic, confusing and nihilistic. There are no heroes and almost every character loses something (or someone) valuable. This is an absolute epic.

Part 1 follows young Shozo Hirono (Bunta Sugawara) who joins the yakuza in Hiroshima just after the war. Not long after joining he kills a member of another gang and gets sent to prison. After his release he gets caught up in a complex struggle for power eventually leading up to a full fledged war. Fuksasaku films all this madness in a chaotic style that really adds realism to the images. With freeze frames, a narrator, headlines from newspapers and sudden burst of extreme violence this movie kicks you in the teeth and leaves you longing for more. Good things we have four more films to look out for. Hang tight.

Japanese title: Jingi naki tatakai Director: Fukasaku Kinji Year: 1973 Studio: Toei

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

After finally finishing my thesis it’s time to start watching cool Japanese movies again. What better way to start again than with a Sleepy Eyes of Death movie. Those movies are easy to watch and usually very rewarding. This time it turned out to be somewhat different. Number 8 in the series seems to be the most difficult to follow. And the least dark and depressing. So, what happens to Nemuri Kyoshiro this time?

In a great but difficult opening scenes, because of all the changing story angles, we witness the aftermath of a robbery at a famous oil traders mansion. Kyoshiro learns of this act by way of the hairdresser of the mansion. It turns out a gang of ex-samurai wants to avenge their master by setting fire to the oil refineries of some nasty merchants. For this they need  the secret combination for making commercially available oil from a commonly found liquid. These samurai are not the only ones looking for this combination. ‘Of course,’ I hear you thinking. And they all want the support/protection of Nemuri. But he doesn’t give it to them. When Nemuri finds out about the plan to burn down Edo, including all the harmless people, he gets mad and uses his Full Moon Cut technique to the fullest to kill everyone connected to the plot. So kids, don’t kill harmless people when Nemuri is around.

This movie is complex but still rewarding. Director Kenji Misumi does a good job and keeps the story flowing nicely. Action is sparse, but good and the end scenes on the roofs of the city are pretty darn good. All in all a fine, but somewhat different entry to the ever expanding collection of Nemuri Kyoshiro movies.

Japanese title: Nemuri Kyoshiro 8: Burai-ken Director: Misumi Kenji Year: 1966 Studio: Toei

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Man, oh man. The titles of these movies keep getting longer and longer. Ok, this one is a variation on the classic Tange Sazen character, made famous in so many stories and movies. The one eyed and one armed fighter is a very cynical ronin fighting battle wherever something can be gained. Sazen is a lady in this version, but not less powerful and blood thirsty than the men. This movie has an enormous body count to prove it. Not that she lives to kill, but when threatened she will not hesitate to pull out her sword.

This sword happens to be Drenched Swallow, a famous sword given to Lady Sazen (O’Kin) as a heirloom. Her former clan boss collects swords and wants it back desperately. He was also the man who disfigured O’Kin as a child. Trouble ahead. Even more trouble ahead when O’Kin rescues a girl from a group of samurai. She finds out the girl was abused by the Minister of Temples. This sets in motion a series of events that will seal the fate of a lot of high placed people…

Japanese title: Onna sazen: Nuretsubame katate giri Director: Kimiyoshi Yasuda Year: 1969 Studio: Daiei

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Hot damn, what a curious movie. Sejiun Suzuki is one of Japans movie renegades and has tackled many genres. A Suzuki movie is instantly recognizable because of the outrageous sets, hip jazz music, dancing and singing and larger than life actors. His main man is often Joe Shishido, you know, the man with the puffy cheeks and the Number 3 Killer in the classic Branded to Kill. In Detective Bureau 2-3 we see Shishido as detective Tajima who wants to go undercover in a gang to find out who took a truck full of guns.

Detective Bureau is a pretty light movie, although there is more shooting than in average war movie. This is the ‘action’ part of the movie, but because of the clumsy way this is done the effect is just not there. Sometimes you get the impression that this is supposed to be a comedy or a parody of the yakuza film. Maybe it’s because of the crappy subtitles that I have such a strange feeling. It’s certainly not a bad movie, but just very weird. But that’s probably just how Suzuki ment it.

Japanese title: Tantei jimusho 23: Kutabare akuto-domo Director: Seijun Suzuki Year: 1963 Studio: Nikkatsu

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Okatsu is a fencing expert in a small town. Her brother Rintaro is supposed to be the expert, but he’d rather run away with his pregnant girlfriend. Their father, the owner of the dojo, has it in for the evil official Shiozaki. In the opening scenes we see Okatsu witnes Shiozaki massacre a village because of the villagers not paying their taxes. Sometime later Rintaro is in a gambling den throwing away his money at a rigged game. Money is lent to him and a debt is born. The owner of the den works with Shiozaki and both Okatsu and her father are taken away because Rintaro has fled. Okatsu and her father are thrown into an ancient cellar where they are tortured and humiliated. Her father dies, but Okatsu manages to escape.  She swears revenge on the people that did her wrong.

This is the second part in the Legends of the Poisonous Seductress trilogy, but there’s not much of a connection between the different movies. We only see Junko Miyazono back and this time as Okatsu. This is a pretty bleak film. You can’t blink with your eyes and someone who was supposed to be trustworthy betrays the characters. I like it. You can’t quit predict what will happen, although in retrospect you could. It says pretty basic and straightforward. It was a nice movie, actually. Miyazon did her best, we saw Tomisaburo Wakayama in a small roll, the action was good and there were some nice set pieces. Yes, not too shabby.

Japanese title: Yoen dokufuden: Hitokiri okatsu Director: Nakagawa Nobuo Year: 1969 Studio: Toei

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

It’s raining hard and a masked man is watching the harbor in his car. When a boat nears he signals with his lights and the men on the boat signal back. The car drives up slowly, and when they are near the people get out and fire at the men on the boat. Money is taken, people are killed, the car gets away. One of the attackers is shot and injured. Masks are taken off and reveal our hero Bunta Sugawara and an old lady, who turns out to be his mom. They drive to an old entrance to the sewers and stow away the money behind a wall. The injured accomplice is killed and mom and son drive off. Welcome to Yokohama Underworld. Beware of the Machine Gun Dragon.

This is all in the first minutes of the movie and when you see this you know you are in for a ride. Count in a bizarre mom/son relationship, some hot girls, machineguns, great suits and sunglasses and a couple of weird Americans and you know it’s going to get even stranger. This is nevertheless a pretty good yakuza movie and very entertaining, not in the least because of the above. And almost every film with Bunta in it is a good film. Oh, that’s a bold statement. Sorry!

Japanese title: Yokohama ankokugai mashingan no ryu Director: Okamoto Akihisa Year: 1978 Studio: Toei

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars