Three toseinin, low-class wanderers who follow the yakuza code, go from village to village ready to work or fight for anyone who will give them food and lodging.
Tag: JAPAN
Takeru, a young rebel, is traveling alone in the North of Honshu. He once used to practice pole vaulting but he gave up and became a robber. Along his trip he crosses the path of a young couple doing a performance for a super market. Fascinated by both of them but probably a bit attracted by the mysterious silent girl, he decides to follow them.
A young man tries to overcome the hostility of his girlfriend’s father, a tuna fisherman, by getting the older man to teach him the secrets of his dangerous trade.
A couple of small-time drug runners gets caught up in an all out war between rivaling international drug cartels. The bodies quickly piles up, making the cops take notice too…
Almost a decade before Imamura’s Vengeance Is Mine, Shindo crafted this fascinating documentary-inspired portrait of a serial killer that drew upon the actual events of a troubled nineteen-year old who went on a murderous rampage, killing four people with a pistol stolen from an US navel base. Shindo’s meticulous research into the background of the anti-social youth, including extensive interviews with his mother and acquaintances, brings a rare authenticity of unexpected detail to a film that also reads as an astute critique of American imperialism and reckless tabloid journalism.
Three high-school students tangle with indulgent yakuza and lackadaisical police as they set out in search of the class bully, who has been kidnapped.
9th-graders Kazuo (boy) and Kazumi (girl) take a tumble at a temple in a small seacoast town in Japan. Through supernatural intervention, their minds and bodies are switched, and the result is a touching and hilarious coming-of-age comedy as they attempt to survive the pressures of junior high school life.
Shindo’s “Hymn” is one of many adaptions of Tanizaki’s classical novella ‘Shunkinsho’ (‘A Portrait of Shunkin’, 1933). The story tells of the adoration of Sasuke for his mistress, the blind samisen-teacher Shunkin, who treats him imperiously and subjects him to cruel beatings. After an unknown intruder probably one of her pupils, who seeks revenge for her cruel behaviour, pours boiling water on the sleeping Shunkin’s face, Sasuke blinds himself in order not to behold her disfigurement. Sasuke’s sacrifice, made in response to Shunkin’s tacit wish, seals their life-long relationship.