Should we give you a free shave? Or maybe just slice your throat?
Stolen gold, ninja gangs, portable canons, and all out action: a look at Nikkatsu’s colourful take on Bond. Arrivederci, Leoparda Carina!
From Spy Novel to Nikkatsu Spy
At the peak of the 1960s spy craze, Nikkatsu was looking for material for its next action-hit when it hit the jackpot: ‘Triple Exposure’, a 1964 spy thriller novel by Tsuzuki Michio featuring an usual plot, a charismatic protagonist, and…
A new kind of violence replaced the old in lawless Japan. It was every man for himself amidst the chaos.
Synopsis
Set between 1946 and 1956 and based on real-life yakuza memoirs, Battles Without Honor and Humanity charts the formative years of Hirono Shōzō and the Yamamori family, one backstab at a time. Set in a violent and chaotic world, with a matching directing style, a dazzling all-star ensemble cast, and a hefty dose of humour, this masterpiece of the…
You could say he’s a person without a motherland.
Released only one month after Bastards Without Borders (1965), The Dragon of Macao (1965) dips back into Nikkatsu’s noir roots to create a much more nuanced and serious take on the spy genre, while maintaining the usual Nikkatsu action and international touch (surfaced mostly through the protagonist’s murky background and fluency in English and Chinese). Setting aside the genre’s traditional womanising, one-liners, and gadgets (Big Lighter™ and fake exploding briefcase aside),…
De toutes façons, il n’y a pas de frontières pour…
In 1965, Nikkatsu and Kobayashi went full 007 – sorry, Zéro Zéro Cinq (005) – for Bastards Without Borders (1965), the most faithful Bond homage… with a Nikkatsu twist.
After a Japanese gangster is found dead in Thailand with counterfeit dollars, Interpol agent Henmi Shinzuke (Kobayashi Akira), aka 005, must leave and travel back to Japan to investigate. While diligently seducing every woman he meets, Henmi discovers that several…
His name is still whispered as a legendary Hiroshima yakuza. But no one visits his grave now.
Synopsis
Set between 1950 and 1955 and inspired by a real-life yakuza hitman, Deadly Fight in Hiroshima is a side story following the rise and fall of the impetuous Yamanaka Shōji, and of his firecracker nemesis Otomo Katsutoshi. The second entry in the Battles Without Honor and Humanity series is a darker episode, imbued with the burden and trauma of the recent war.…
