From March 9-19, New York’s Japan Society simmers nearly 50 years of yakuza (Japanese mafia) movies—a mainstay of Japanese cinema—in the Globus Film Series Hardest Men in Town: Yakuza Chronicles of Sin, Sex & Violence, featuring 15 of the genre’s sharpest selections.
In addition to acclaimed classics by directors Hideo Gosha (The Wolves) and Kinji Fukasaku (Cops vs. Thugs, Battles Without Honor and Humanity), the series includes lesser known titles and overlooked treasures by Seijun Suzuki (Youth of the Beast), Takashi Miike (Dead or Alive), Rokuro Mochizuki (A Yakuza In Love, Onibi: The Fire Within), and Academy Award winner Sydney Pollack (The Yakuza), as well as contemporary incarnations of the genre such as Takeshi Kitano’s Outrage. Among eight premieres, four will receive their first screening outside of Japan.
The fest ignites Wednesday (March 9) with a special introduction and live Q&A by celebrated filmmaker Paul Schrader for The Yakuza, Sydney Pollack's overlooked 1970s gem starring Robert Mitchum and Ken Takakura. The film was Schrader’s debut as a screenwriter (in collaboration with his brother Leonard and Chinatown scribe Robert Towne), and he would go on to pen the scripts for Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver and Raging Bull and direct such diverse works as American Gigolo and Mishima, among others. Few films show more deference and respect to Japanese film culture than The Yakuza, which has been lauded as the most original introduction to its eponymous genre.
In conjunction with the March 10 screening of Onibi: The Fire Within, Japan Society welcomes renowned Tokyo Vice author Jake Adelstein, one of the foremost experts on organized crime in Japan, for the discussion Yakuza in Popular Media & Real Life: Cracks & Chasms. The American-born Adelstein worked for 12 years as Japanese-language reporter for the Yomiuri Shinbun, Japan's largest newspaper, and from 2006 to 2007 he was the chief investigator for a U.S. State Department-sponsored study of human trafficking in Japan. Now a writer and consultant in Japan and the United States, he is working on his second book, The Last Yakuza: A Life in the Japanese Underworld, which is a narrative biography of one former gang boss, and also covers the history of the mob in Japan after the second world war to the present.
The March 11 screening of The Wolves is followed by the opening week “Gangsta Party,” with prizes for the best modern day gangster garb or any man or woman wearing the classic yakuza kimono.
Steeped in cryptic ritual and customs, from full-body tattoos to missing digits, the violent, romantic world of yakuza has excited the imagination and inspired Japanese cinema since the 1960s. In the darkness of movie theaters, the yakuza became the very picture of superhuman macho cool and reptilian menace. Showing grand visions of manly amity and betrayal, early productions featured chivalrous kimono-clad, sword-wielding gangsters and gamblers, who set the stage for today's ruthless gun-toting villains dealing in debt, hustling hardcore porn and scheming and scamming in dark trades and even darker deeds.
“The genre’s cultural phenomenon harkens back to the days of when samurai still embodied traditionalist values of honor, selfless duty (giri) and the noble warrior spirit (ninkyo) on the silver screen,” notes Samuel Jamier, who oversees Japan Society’s film programming and curated the series. “The yakuza--shadowy demimonde of organized crime (which included wandering gamblers and lowly peddlers)--rivaled with the noble swordsmen as the representatives of honor and heroism, in the context of a rapidly changing society trying to come to terms with a shameful defeat.”
Film details and screening schedule for Japan’s Society’s Hardest Men in Town (click titles for plot summaries):
Wednesday, March 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Introduced by screenwriter Paul Schrader followed by a Q&A after the film.
1975, 112 min., color, in English and Japanese (with English subtitles). Directed by Sydney Pollack. With Robert Mitchum, Ken Takakura, Brian Keith, Herb Edelman, Richard Jordan, Keiko Kishi, Eiji Okada, James Shigeta, Kyosuke Machida, Christina Kokubo, Eiji Go, Lee Chirillo.
Onibi: The Fire Within (Onibi)
Thursday, March 10 at 8:15 pm
U.S.Premiere; introduced by Tokyo Vice author Jake Adelstein.
Preceded by the 6:30 p.m. discussion Yakuza in Popular Media & Real Life: Cracks & Chasms.
1997, 101 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Rokuro Mochizuki. With Yoshio Harada, Reiko Kataoka, Sho Aikawa, Ko Kitamura.
Friday, March 11 at 7:30 p.m.
Followed by opening week "Gangsta Party."
1971, 131 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles.Directed by Hideo Gosha. With Tatsuya Nakadai, Noboru Ando, Kyoko Enami, Tetsuro Tanba.
Filmgoers are invited to the “Gangsta Party” after party with all-female Japanese punk rock band High Teen Boogie. Costume suggestions: old-school gangsta, modern-day playa or a high rolla. Free entry for ladies and gentlemen who come in a kimono (limited to availability.)
The Walls of Abashiri Prison (pt. 3): Longing for Home (Abashiri Bangaichi: Bokyo-hen)
Saturday, March 12 at 1:00 p.m.
International premiere.
1965, 89 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Teruo Ishii. With Ken Takakura, Hiroko Sakuramachi, Naoki Sugiura, Kunie Tanaka.
Brutal Tales of Chivalry (Showa Zankyo den)
Saturday, March 12 at 3 p.m.
International premiere.
1965, 90 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Kiyoshi Saeki. With Ken Takakura, Ryo Ikebe, Yoshiko Mita, Shinjiro Ebara.
Theater of Life: Hishakaku (Jinsei Gekijo: Hishakaku)
Saturday, March 12 at 5:15 p.m.
U.S. premiere.
1963, 95 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Tadashi Sawashima. With Koji Tsuruta, Ken Takakura, Yoshiko Sakuma and Ryunosuke Tsukigata.
Blood of Revenge (Meiji kyokyakuden: Sandaime shumei)
Saturday, March 12 at 7:30 p.m.
1965, 91 min., 16 mm., color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Tai Kato. With Koji Tsuruta, Junko Fuji, Kanjuro Arashi, Masahiko Tsugawa.
Cops Vs. Thugs (Kenkei tai soshiki boryoku)
Sunday, March 13 at 3:15 p.m.
1975, 100 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Kinji Fukasaku. With Bunta Sugawara, Seizo Fukumoto, Reiko Ike, Nobuo Kaneko, Yoko Koizumi.
1973, 91 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Kinji Fukasaku. With Bunta Sugawara, Akira Kobayashi, Tsunehiko Watase, Shingo Yamashiro, Reiko Ike, Nobuo Kaneko, Hiroki Matsukata, Tetsuro Tamba.
Youth of the Beast (Yaju no seishun)
Sunday, March 13 at 7:30 p.m.
1963. 92 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Seijun Suzuki. With Joe Shishido, Misako Watanabe, Tamio Kawaji, Ichiro Kijima, Mizuho Suzuki.
Tuesday, March 15 at 7:30 p.m.
1999, 105 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese and Mandarin with English subtitles. Directed by Takashi Miike. With Riki Takeuchi, Sho Aikawa, Renji Ishibashi, Hitoshi Ozawa, Shingo Tsurumi, Kaoru Sugita, Ren Osugi.
A Yakuza in Love A.K.A. Villainous Love (Koi Gokudo)
Thursday, March 17 at 7:30 p.m.
International premiere.
Special preview ofthe exhibition Bye Bye Kitty!!!
1997, 110 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Rokuro Mochizuki. With Eiji Okuda, Yuna Natsuo, Shunsuke Matsuoka.
From 6:00-7:30 p.m., ticketholders get an exclusive sneak preview of Japan Society’s spring exhibition Bye Bye Kitty!!! Between Heaven and Hell in Contemporary Japanese Art, opening March 18. Among 40 installations of sculpture, painting, video and photography, from some of the most evocative artists living and working in Japan today, are such genre-appropriate works as a dress with yards of blood streaming from it, a bevy of geisha grandmothers, happy-go-lucky school girls committing harakiri, a life-size glass-bulb-bedazzled taxidermy deer, a tattooed warrior, and a spectacular 23-foot mural of mountains composed of thousands of dead salarymen.
Friday, March 18 at 7:30 p.m.
International premiere.
1983, 92 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Toru Kawashima. With Shoji Kaneko, Eiko Nagashima, Koji Kita, Kinzoh Sakura.
Yakuza Wives (Gokudo no onna-tachi)
Saturday, March 19 at 5:00 p.m.
U.S. premiere.
1986, 120 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with live English subtitles. Directed by Hideo Gosha. With Shima Iwashita, Rino Katase, Akiko Kana, Riki Takeuchi.
Saturday, March 19, at 7:30 p.m.
New York premiere.
2010, 109 min., 35 mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. Directed by Takeshi Kitano, With Beat Takeshi, Kippei Shiina, Ryo Kase, Tomokazu Miura, Jun Kunimura.
Hardest Men in Town: Yakuza Chronicles of Sin, Sex & Violencetakes place March 9-19 atJapan Society, 333 East 47th Street (between First and Second avenues). Tickets are $12 general admission, $9 members, students and seniors, EXCEPT: March 10 is $12/$8 for lecture only, $12/$9 for film only or $16/$12 for lecture and film; and the March 11 The Wolves screening is $16/$12 including after party. For reservations, visit www.japansociety.org/hardest_men_in_town or call the box office at (212) 715-1258. Purchasers of more than five tickets for at least five different films receive $2 off of each ticket (available only in person at the box office or by telephone—special offer not available for online purchases).
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