Customer Reviews

The Yakuza

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Well, if this film doesn't put hair on your chest, nothing will.

Look up 'film noir' in the dictionary and there should be a picture of Robert Mitchum in The Yakuza, alongside Bogie in The Maltese Falcon. It's that good of a film.

The theme is about honor, or "giri." The last bastion of manhood in an relativistic world ambivalent towards heroism, unsure about any values, moral or otherwise, and gone to hell.

Against this background, you may be a tad on the shady side of the law, but do you keep faith with your friends?
For that matter, would you risk taking a bullet for someone you personally loathe but whom you "owe" because he's saved the life of your wife and child?

The plot begins when Mitchum is approached by an old army buddy that he hasn't heard from in decades, save for the annual obligatory Christmas card. His daughter's been kidnapped by Japanese mobsters and he needs his help.

As to Mitchum, his character is established in one line.
"You've been successful?"
Mitchum: "That depends on how you figure those things."

True enough. He has no family, no friends, no one even remotely close. The film noir loner, now in his sixties.

He goes back to Japan, links up with the only woman he ever loved, and the one enemy who can help him gain entry into the dark world of the Yakuza; an ultra-traditionalist latter-day Samurai ( Tanaka Ken ) who "owes" Mitchum.

One small problem, he's no longer a Yakuza. He's been out of the mob for years. When Mitchum finds out this unpleasant bit of inforation and blurts out "I can't ask you to do that!" Tanaka Ken quietly replies: "You already have."

The aged warriors go to it again. A great story of love and betrayal. Acted in a style of understated whispers between flashing katanas that bring the house down.

When we were living in New York City, and I was twelve, my Dad told my Mom that he was taking me somewhere for a few hours. To my delight, we ended up at a ratty movie theater on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. These were the days before the monster multi-plexes. I can't remember the exact address, but it was a large one room gig that had seen it's better days. From what I could tell, some cool guy had come up with the idea of programming this low-rent theater with old Samurai flicks usually starting with the name Yojimbo...Yojimbo meets the One-Armed Warrior...you get the idea.

So, my Dad is paying for the two of us, and right before we walk inside he leans down and says to me, "You know, this is the closest thing I've ever seen to understanding the differences between the East and West." You gotta understand that my Dad hardly ever said anything. So, this comment blew me away. My attention was riveted. It took me by the collar and pulled my focus away from the windex/old candy odor of the floors, the torn seat cushions where I was sure some old rats called home, and the dirty beach towel someone had hung to keep the light out of the hallway into the "theater."

The movie exceeded my expectations. It all starts with the shot of a gangster with tatoos all over the back of his body. Safe to say, even if you've seen or read the Illustrated Man, you've never seen anything like this before. I mean who the heck would ever let anyone tattoo them from neck to toe? You've basically got it all. Robert Mitchum in his creaky, world-weary mode, delivering lines like a T-Rex with attitude. You've got supporting roles from the likes of Brian Keith who brings a sad, pathetic lining to his double-crossing, gambling freak role. How far you've come from that crappy seventies TV family show--dude, you can act!

Then, you've got a terrific foil for Mitchum in one of Japan's leading actors of all time. The hate between these characters is communicated in a glance, in the quiet way lines are delivered. The two men both loved the same woman--and she only took up with Mitchum's character because she thought her husband was dead. What a sad, true-to-life premise. Circling the three are a band of wolves, the gangsters from this Japanese Organized Crime Syndicate aka The Yakuza.

Hold onto your hat when the bad guys invade the private home and literally mow down the Westerners--sticking a sword in the gut of one guy. I am telling you, when this happened, I thought I could feel the cold metal entering my spleen. It all winds up with a really great take-the-battle-to-the-enemy conclusion where Mitchum goes in with his metal boot kicking down rice paper walls, with two shotguns blazing. The sword work is elegant, terrifying and so real, again, it hurts.

But, the real scene that you will always remember is the denoument, when Mitchum slices off the tip of his finger, what appears to be real perspiration rolling down his forehead, and offers it as a gift to atone for his wrongdoing. I thought about this ending for years. I kept hearing my Dad's voice whispering in my ear outside on the sidewalk...the differences between East and West.

Watch this movie in your best "Lost in Translation" mode. Know that it is an original painting--nothing about it is derivative. Give it a chance to breathe. Ask yourself, what if this were me? Would I walk into a massacre about to happen out of honor? In the end, the message, I think, is that an honorable life is the only way to go for men and women who only have their honor at the end of the day.

This movie is one of the best action films to be made in the seventies and late sixties. It stays away from the anti-establishment preachiness so popular during that time and goes for classic hard-boiled action. And, as noted by others ,also explores the concepts of honor and friendship. During this time period several of Hollywood's older leading men who had been real studs in the forties and early fifties (Mitchum, Holden, Brian Keith, John Wayne) were turning out some superior action movies with intelligent scripts. The Yakuza is no exception. Here you have two wildly different cultures meeting, clashing, but also finding much in common. Two strong and principled men working together, even though at first they dislike one another, both always having to work at staying true to their principles while dealing with the world and those who are not so ethical. Some might find the message that violence and vengence have a place in the scheme of things and can actually be cleansing to be disturbing, but this story is about two warriors(essentially). The warrior strives for perfection in many things, but pacifiscm isn't one of those. When one is betrayed by a friend,or one's blood is betrayed then retribution must be dealt to the betrayer and sometimes honor can only be restored by cutting off one's finger. To a Western viewer much of this is inconceivable - we're all to enlightened anymore, but I found this movie to have a ring of truth to it. Though when I recently watched it with my wife she found it to be somewhat grotesque. She loves the Lethal Weapon movies - which have as much substance to them as cotton candy. This movie is a much more solid piece of filmaking in which the violence has a place. I found it to be restrained and not gratuitous. It dosen't frolic in death and mayhem for it's own sake. But having said that the action pieces are fantastic. I also own Black Rain which is an okay action flick, but once you watch The Yakuza you'll see it for what it is - a pale imitation. Watch this movie if you get the chance. you won't regret it.

The Yakuza is one of the great films of the seventies. Although this didn't make much noise in the seventies (despite a truly surreal promotional gimmick, `Join the Yakuza Set' tattoo transfers!), it has held up a lot better than he plethora of seventies thrillers that swamped it at the time.

Belonging to that subgenre of Americans-in-Japan thrillers (Fuller's House of Bamboo, Scott's Black Rain, Frankenheimer's The Challenge), The Yakuza is a film about the price of honor and about people who face their responsibilities. The film could almost be called `giri' - Japanese for obligation or the burden hardest to bear. Richard Jordan's bodyguard may start out wiseguy ("That can work both ways. If you ain't alive tomorrow, he don't owe you s***.") but even he lives up to his moral obligations when discharged from them by Mitchum. All of the plot developments are a result of obligations, with the characters following through as per their personal codes of honor, taken to the ultimate extreme in Mitchum's final apology to Takakura Ken for destroying both his past and his future.

The hook might be that Mitchum returns to Japan to help secure the release of an old army friend's daughter from a Yakuza clan and in the process reopening old wounds with former lover Kishi Keiko and her brother Takakura Ken, but the emotional undercurrents are as important as the plot developments, with the film's criminal double-dealing mirrored in the myriad personal betrayals he is as he is forced to face the fact that he has always confused his friends with his enemies.

It is not a film that wears its emotions on its sleeve, and is all the more affecting for that the awkwardness of Mitchum's meeting with Ken and the hesitancy of his reunion with Keiko (and the subtle re-enactment of the old photos in her album) - everything is in the pauses and between the lines. It's these emotional undercurrents that make it stand up to repeated viewings.

The early seventies was a last golden age for the eternally under-rated Mitchum, with outstanding performances in The Friends of Eddie Coyle, Farewell My Lovely and Ryan's Daughter, and this is one of his best. His `strange stranger' and Takakura Ken's `man who never smiles' ("He's been unhappy ever since he lost the war. I keep trying to tell him it's not his fault but he won't take my word for it") is a match made in casting heaven. Their screen presence is remarkably similar, exuding a lifetime of world-weariness and personal loss that attracts both empathy and respect for their characters. Both give superbly understated performances, with the great Takakura Ken getting his best English-language role to date.

Jordan gives a nicely unassuming performance in the juvenile lead, making the most of his romantic subplot by showing the least, and there's an added poignancy to his fate since the actor's death. Indeed, all the performances are superb, with the emphasis on being rather than acting.

The screenplay as filmed is a terrific mixture of the commercial and the cerebral. Where most modern American thrillers are driven by indiscriminate violence ("In America, a guy cracks up he opens a window and kills a few strangers. Here, a guy cracks up, he closes the window and kills himself," observes Jordan), here events and participants are interconnected. All of the main characters are friends or surrogate family, and although Robert Towne was brought in to up the gangster element from the Shraders' (Leonard and Paul) more philosophical approach (the differences can be found in Leonard Schrader's novelization), he knows enough to keep it personal. It's witty too, without being condescending or resorting to the pre-kill one-liners so prevalent today that divorce the audience from the consequences and ramifications of violence. Only a very dialog-heavy bit of exposition about the backstory between Mitchum and Keiko feels a tad clumsy.

Sydney Pollack's sensitivity to the material is remarkable. There's an unshowy adventurousness to his direction that he hasn't displayed since. In particular, the action scenes are extraordinary without ever straying from the credible, a disciplined mixture of stillness and sudden violence and a complete departure in style for the director.

Warners' new DVD is long overdue, and very welcome indeed. Extras are a little thin - a very good 19-minute promotional featurette from 1974, Promises to Keep, and an audio commentary from Sydney Pollack - and it's disappointing that the deleted scenes from the longer 123-minute version of the film are not included.

The movie is excellent. It really rates 5 stars for its strong plot, acting, direction, and camera work. The theme throughout is honor, and obligation. But pay attention to the "obligation" part. There is the notion that we are defined by our obligations, a concept that is vastly different between east and west. Personally, I think we could use a little more of the Japanese context of obligation in our own society and culture. And this movie's depiction appeals to something in me that is, admittedly, fundamentally romantic.

My problem with the video is this: there are omissions from this version that were in the first version I saw. Some footage has been edited out, and although its omission does not adversely affect the story line, it was an effective contribution. Also, there are sections where subtitles are omitted. (My most recent viewing was in the company of a friend who speaks Japanese and English, and they provided their own comments regarding the accuracy, not necessarily of the English rendering, but more on what the Japanese "should" have been in the context.) Mind you, the movie is in English, with some segments of Japanese dialog. But it was disappointing that some of the most eloquent dialog wasn't even translated.

Maybe someone, somewhere, will grant my wish and produce an unexpurgated version on DVD ...

I have never seen this particular version of the video. I have the original one that came out and guard it jealously! What I cannot understand is why this movie has never been released on DVD!... There are so many underlying themes throughout this movie besides that of the main plot of betrayal by old Army buddies and the honor gained through the loyalty of newly formed friendship between Mitchum and Ken. I've often wondered if I would experience the same feelings Mitchum experienced coming back to Tokyo, if I went back to Saigon and saw those I knew back when I was in Nam. What a feeling to see how much things had changed and yet remained the same. There are many deep themes explored in this movie. Definitely one of Sidney Pollack's more under rated, yet finer films for nuance!... I highly recommend this movie to anyone who wants more than swords and blood.

I have seen this movie numerous times and NEVER tire of watching it. As someone involved in Japanese Budo and having been to Japan several times, I get lost in the movie each time. Watching Takakura Ken perform the first Iaido kata-Ippon Mae: Mai is excellent.
The cast speaks for itself. Premier actors/actresses. I even see Kishi Keiko on shows I watch now on Japanese TV. One of the central and underlying themes is that of "Giri"-translated by Ken as "the burden hardest to bear". I think we in the west have by and large no real sense of that level of indebtedness. And for that I am sorry. The story is well written AND the soundtrack will be availble soon on CD after 30 years!!!!!! I am so very happy. Now all we need to do is cut this movie released in its full length (123 minutes in Japan) with both Japanese and English dialogue and subtitles in DVD, REGION FREE format. What a great day that will be ;-)
For those students of Budo, Japanese culture and who want a glimpse into the multi-layered aspects of that culture, I highly recommend it! (The previous was an unpaid endorsement of this title).

Notable for one of the first big payday screenplay in the industry for Paul Schrader before his success w/ Taxi Driver, nuanced and sensitive to things Japanese - due in large part to brother Leonard, who was a devotee of the country and its culture, who did the original treatment and was uncredited (And again in Mishima, over which the brothers broke.).

A remarkable fusion of noir sensibility (not to forget Towne) and yakuza ethos, The Yakuza is an effective action picture possessing tremendous emotional range and depth, and the emotions on-screen are supple and powerful. You don't expect tenderness of this kind in this genre: between parents and child, lovers, husband and wife, ultimately friends, the tidal affects of bonds and obligation. The regard of the film toward its object is fairly loving - compare to such later projects as the Michael Douglas vehicle, Ridley Scott's Black Rain with its rampant machismo imperialism and condescending xenophobia.

Mitchum has never been better or more world weary. And you understand why Ken Takakura is the Clint Eastwood of Japan. An unlikely pairing, and an odd buddy pairing picture of two men a world apart bonded by perverse fate, There are at least two love stories and a fight set-piece that can compare to anything in Tarantino.

Dave Grusin did the score, Pollack directs. What a class act.

A beautiful film, by any standard. Marshall Fine says it best when he calls it "surprisingly heartfelt and deliciously exciting" in the review above. Like all of the greatest action films, the emphasis is on character development and interaction. Even so, the action scenes are breathtaking. Sydney Pollack directs like Akira Kurosawa and Howard Hawks, with outbursts of violence happening rapidly and intensely without being gratuitous. Robert Mitchum is excellent as always, as is the rest of the cast. This would make an excellent Warner budget line DVD, if presented in an anamorphic transfer at the film's original 2.35:1 aspect ratio (the way that Warner has presented Just Cause and other movies). Please release the DVD soon!

I am continually surprised no one I talk to about this movie has heard of it. This is really a fantastic gangster/crime movie in every way with a great story playing off the common giri vs. ninjo japanese motif. Having spent time in Japan, this is one of few American movies that treats the Japanese culture as more than a one dimensional gimmick. Mitchum and Takakura Ken are perfect. I really feel this movie is one of the greatest of all time, certainly on par with recognized 70's greats like TAXI DRIVER (from coscripter Paul Schrader) and CHINATOWN (from coscripter Rober Towne). Do not miss this one!