3.5 Japanese films from me this week 
斬、/ Killing (yes, the comma is included in the title; don’t ask me why)
2018, Shin’ya Tsukamoto
In 19th century Japan, a ronin helps villagers of a quiet village tend their land. He has an opportunity to join another ronin and get a job in Edo for the shogun, but when outlaws reach the village, trouble ensues.
zzz
Indie director Tsukamoto is best known for his “industrial” horror and I was curious what he might do with a period piece.
The story was intriguing at first, but for me it broke down in the final act and how it all turned out didn’t make a lot of sense… maybe I just missed something it was trying to say 
Unfortunately, Tsukamoto’s usual handheld jerky cam style doesn’t work here, neither with the quieter more personal scenes, nor with the action scenes. The latter are very few, and while there is one quite bloody and gory, I’d argue that the best bits when fewer swordcuts are involved (one scene early on is very cool, but the final one suffers greatly from the filming style).
However when the camera does rest for a bit though… it captures some very fine imagery.
The sound design is… weird, with the music and environmental sounds given a much higher volume compared to the dialogue. And the music is hit or miss, some of the synth/industrial pieces are highly out of place here, but the drums pieces early on were quite good.
The IMDb score is on point I suppose…
…but then, Yu Aoi is in it (further fuelling Tsukamoto’s obsession with skinny women) and she made the 80mins runtime worthwhile 
あなたへ / Dearest
2012, Yasuo Furuhata
Prison officer Kurashima travels 1200km across Japan to scatter his wife’s ashes in the sea near her hometown.
zzz
A very good slow, quiet and even cozy road trip film. While on the road and also at his destination, Kurashima meets various people and learns a bit about their lives, while also coming to terms with his wife’s death. There are flashbacks to their relationship, but it’s not a cheesy romance film.
As expected, the journey takes us across some beautiful scenery, and the stories told were all interesting. There were a couple of lighting issues (well, either they got the lighting wrong on location or used a green screen, not sure) but otherwise it does look mighty good.
The cherry on top was a surprise appearance (to me, because I hadn’t checked the credits in advance) by Haruka Ayase
Ken Takakura may have been too old to play Kurashima, but I thought this was a fine sendoff for “Clint Eastwood of Japan” after a brilliant career. He would pass away two years later from lymphoma, same as the wife’s character in the film.
網走番外地 / Abashiri Prison
1965, Teruo Ishii
Abashiri Prison is located in the coldest place in Japan. Two men, handcuffed together have escaped from the prison, one a yakuza (Shinichi), the other a petty criminal (Gonda), and although they hate each other they must work together if they are to evade capture in this harshest of climates.
zzz
I thought after watching Ken Takakura’s final film I should maybe watch his first as well, but sadly could not get hold of it. So then on to the next best thing: his breakthrough role towards stardom.
It’s a (loose) remake of The Defiant Ones, but also borrowing from a Japanese novel written by a former inmate at Abashiri Prison in the 50s.
I thought it was just okay, but the Japanese at least seemingly do not agree: this first outing spawned no less than 17 sequels, all starring Takakura 
Two thirds of the film actually take place within the prison and are intended to make Shinichi a likeable character both by “present” behaviour and by giving us his unhappy background in flashbacks (successfully, I suppose) with only the last part covering “the great escape” - the actiony bits in this final act are quite cool, and of course the harsh wintry scenery of 北海道 is captivating - they weren’t necessarily aiming to show us the local landscape, more like they couldn’t avoid it 
Acting is typical Japanese “flair”, borderline excessive. While they did not have the original’s black-dude-and-white-dude dynamics, the good-guy-bad-guy duo here still works.
A couple of nice tunes for the sountrack, dunno if they were written and performed for the film or if they were older ones (seemingly written in “praise” of the prison).
Not a bad watch as such, but I’m not keen on watching others from the series… although it seems the third installment is considered to be the best.
And then the 0.5 comes, quite unexpectedly, from a Hollywood flick
The Yakuza
1974, Sydney Pollack
Harry Kilmer, a retired PI, travels to Japan to rescue a long-time (shady) friend’s daughter who was kidnapped by the yakuza. There he enlists the help of Ken Tanaka, a retired yakuza who is the brother of Eiko, the woman Harry fell in love with after the end of WW2.
zzz
I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m not a fan of yakuza films, just as I am not a fan of mob movies.
So I approached this one with some caution, fully expecting it to be one I’d fall asleep during
But it was surprisingly good! …And kept me up and hooked throughout.
It’s a good story with multiple twists - one regarding the Americans rather predictable, another regarding the Japanese wholly unexpected -, plenty of action - a swordfight in the final act is extremely cool even better than those in (some) samurai films, and of course the cowboy will bring guns to a swordfight Face with hand over mouth -, superb acting from both Robert Mitchum - I liked him better here than in a lot of his earlier films - and Ken Takakura - doing what he does best, I suppose, the honorable yakuza.
One thing the film does well, I think, is in its attempt to explain the concept of 義理 - I had learned it here on WK as “sense of duty” and I guess I was vaguely aware of “giri” in general but didn’t make the association until last evening 
(If someone unfamiliar with it wants to read the explanation on Wikipedia, I’d recommend skipping the “In popular culture” section on that page as it contains a major spoiler for this film.)
Harry and Ken are not friends - and by the end of the film we learn (together with Harry) the full mystery surrounding their relationship -, but Ken owes a debt to Harry and he will fulfill that obligation with no regard to its costs on his own self.
Although the camerawork can get a little hectic in the action scenes, it is still well shot throughout. The direction overall was also very good, I thought, especially considering Pollack had to work with both Americans and Japanese.
One minor “complaint” would be that perhaps Mitchum was too old compared to Takakura, as I guess they were supposed to be of approximately the same age but there’s a ~15 years difference and it shows, I’d say even later on Takakura had aged better than Mitchum. But it’s really more of an observation than a drawback, they were both wonderful and made for a great pair.
Another point of contention, and the only real one I had:
Harry is portrayed as the “white saviour” in the “past” of the film (a saviour from a situation he - or not Harry himself but his fellow conationals - created), and in its “present” he rather nonchalantly walks back in to collect the debt on this “saving” because of course it was not solely out of the goodness of the saviour’s heart. Maybe this wasn’t Pollack’s intention, but it is totally American, and it sounds rather familiar today what with a certain someone’s trade tarriffs talks being mingled in with debt collection on “the protection” given to some Asian countries, Japan included…
But anyhow… a very good film, underrated I think but it gets a “highly recommended” from yours truly.
I just forgot to post in this thread.
but every new one i could find was still in cinemas in japan or not released yet. 
