Minoru Sawada

A man leaves his family in Tokyo to travel and engage in various sexual escapades. When he returns home he finds out that his wife is starring in Imamura’s documentary about her search for her missing husband.

Pinku from 1965.

Pinku from 1967.

The great Sonny Chiba stars as Goro Saionji, a drifting thrill-seeker. Out to investigate a suspisious plane crash in the Red Valley, he uncovers a plot involving yakuza and a shady land developer to evict an old farmer off of his land to build a sky resort. Goro must now help the old farmer and his daughter and take those criminals on.

A wealthy real estate investor is forced to watch the rape of his girlfriend and then is sent a film showing the fact. He hires a hitman, Sho, and shows him the film, so that the detective can get rid of the criminals. But the boss of the criminal band is Ko, Sho's archnemesis, who raped and murdered his girlfriend.

As his investments in the stock market fail, a man finds himself in serious debt to a lecherous loan-shark named Uchiyama. The man's wife hires herself to Uchiyama to buy time for the husband to pay off the debt. After Uchiyama uses the wife to provide companionship for his mentally-impaired son, she is hit by a car, and her husband falls into despair and illness. Their daughter works as a nightclub dancer, intending to save the money to help with the debt. After her father's suicide, the girl decides to get revenge.

Sabu and his pals hold a pauper's funeral for Sabu's mother. His brother Jiro arrives home, fresh out of jail, and Sabu pointedly states that Jiro is not invited. Jiro meanwhile is planning a big job - steal 40 million in cash and drugs, and he invites Sabu and gang to act as decoys, for 50,000 each. The sting is a success, but the double-crossing starts almost immediately. Sabu discovers how little of the take they were promised and hides the stash. Jiro and his slimy partner pressure the kids to fess up. Meanwhile, their respectable elder brother Ichiro is being leaned on by the town's big boss, whose money it was.

Pinku from 1967.

A yakuza man is released from prison after serving a long sentence. He immediately sets about creating a new gang and attempts to pull off a huge ransom score.

Koharu, a young geisha, is in love with Kenichi, an apprentice carpenter to her father Masagoro. Their love life comes to a sudden halt after an argument between their two fathers. Can their love survive in spite of the bitterness between their two families?

G-men challenge a jewelry smuggling ring. The chase starts in Kyushu and continues to Kobe to Yokohama.

Shinichi “Sonny” Chiba returns as the reckless son of a private detective takes on the case of a minor league baseball pitcher who disappears right before signing a contract into the major leagues. Meanwhile, the body of an orthopedist is discovered in the river.

A detective investigating a serial rapist discovers that he and the perpetrator come from the same lineage of depraved individuals, a genealogy of violent and sexually perverse deviants that stretches through the Meiji, Taisho and Showa eras and can even be traced back to the Edo era.

Fukasaku and Chiba are back in a sequel filmed with the same cast and released just two weeks after the first film. This time the storyline is set in a small seaside town and the film favours detective and watadori film influences over westerns. Like its predecessor, the film runs barely over one hour and never drags. It’s a little less goofy, but doesn’t have as beautiful landscapes the first movie had. Not an especially good film, but for fans of Fukasaku and Chiba it’s an entertaining if flawed 60 minutes.

After a successful robbery the culprits, from very different backgrounds, at once turn on each other.

Based on the mystery novel of the same name by Seichō Matsumoto.

1961 Japanese movie

1962 Japanese movie

1962 Japanese movie

1962 Japanese movie