Movies: Japanese noir

In the midst of an attempt to take over his company, a powerhouse executive is hit with a huge ransom demand when his chauffeur's son is kidnapped by mistake....

A noir drama depicting the downfall of a veteran detective who hates evil and falls into its depths. Ace detective Sugai pursues Chiyo, the mistress of a man who was arrested for extortion, and takes advantage of her weakness. However, as his colleag...

In this loose adaptation of "Hamlet," illegitimate son Kôichi Nishi climbs to a high position within a Japanese corporation and marries the crippled daughter of company vice president Iwabuchi. At the reception, the wedding cake is a replica of their...

After yakuza boss Kurata dissolves his own criminal empire, a rival kingpin offers a position to Kurata's top operative, Tetsuya "Phoenix Tetsu" Hondo. When the fiercely loyal Tetsu declines, Otsuka taps unstoppable Tatsuzo the "Viper", a ruthless gu...

A gangster gets released from prison and has to cope with the recent shifts of power between the gangs, while taking care of a thrill-seeking young woman, who got in bad company while gambling....

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 invit...

A former boxer gets involved with a club hostess trying to escape the clutches of her gangster employer....

When a married man begins an affair with a woman from his past, he comes to suspect her young son intends to murder him....

A sniper kills two prisoners in a police van, and the driver sets out to find the killer....

A private detective is hired to find a missing man by his wife. While his search is unsuccessful, the detective's own life begins to resemble the man for whom he is searching....

Udaka is a new, post-war city where corruption has already taken hold. A persistent district attorney wants to arrest and convict Katsumata, a laughing, self-confident thug. The D.A. gets an anonymous letter about the suicide five years' before of a ...

Businessmen arrange the early release from prison of Togawa, serving time for taking revenge on the truck driver whose carelessness confined Togawa's sister, Rie, to a wheelchair. They want Togawa to hijack an armored truck loaded with 120 million ye...

Set in post-war Japan, a group of five, four men and one woman, gathers in the basement of a butcher shop to dig up a cache of morphine buried during the war. A grimly humorous tale of twisted relationships as one by one each of the group is eliminat...

Based on the original novel by Tokuda Shusei, adapted by frequent Masumura scribe Kaneto Shindo, this downbeat melodrama features a battle of women for the affections and commitment of the same man, a handsome car salesman. Masuko is the number one h...

A gang lord hires Kamimura, a hit man, to take out a rival boss who's gotten greedy....

A juvenile delinquent gets out of the pen and immediately embarks on a rampage of untethered anger, most of it directed at the girlfriend of the journalist who helped send him up....

Betrayed and disgraced, big-city reporter Kazuya Mizuno is banished to a desk at Kaname's boring little town newspaper. But Kaname isn't as boring as it seems on the surface. Not with characters around like Shimeko, a girl genius with a childlike lac...

College students come up with a scam to rob a gambling house. When it comes time to collect, the money isn't there, leading the young men into even more serious crime....

When 150 guns are stolen from Iwakuni base and two police officers are shot dead, a detective criminal tries to find out the truth....

Yoshida's first feature follows the lives of young students against a background of jazz, emptiness and boredom. The plot is fairly simple: a "good-for-nothing" from a poor background falls in love with the young secretary of his rich friend's father...