Season Seeds (Japan, 1998) [DVD] - 2/5
Two lazy guys stuck in a small apartment. This one is starting to feel a bit like a Yamashita film, and it stars Yamashita himself, but it's neither very funny not especially interesting. 8mm again, runs 19 minutes.
Hiroshi and Rolan (Japan, 1999) [DVD] - 1/5
Frustrating 12 minute short film about a Japanese guy and a very irritating foreign girl in a small hot room. This is not the kind of clever understated humour Yamashita became known for. The only point of interest is Hiroshi Yamamoto in the starring role. Runs 12 long minutes, shot on Hi8 and looks like crap.
105 Yen Hamburger is Not Cheap(Japan, 2000) [DVD] - 2/5
Yet another one room dialogue film, this time about fast food and dating. Yamamoto co-stars and improvises - one can hear Yamashita laughing behind the camera. He's having more fun than the audience. The 15 minute film, shot on digital, feels oddly amateurish considering Yamashita had already completed his enjoyable debut feature film Hazy Life (1999) by that time.
+ Sonny Chiba Special: Part 8
The Loyal 47 Gangsters (Japan, 1963) [VoD] - 2/5
A modern gangster film reworking of the 47 Ronin story, where an innocent lord is forced to commit harakiri, but his loyal samurai swear for revenge. In this version Ken Takakura is a young gang boss tricked by the villainous Toru Abe. His underlings, lead by Chiezo Kataoka, start planning for revenge after Takakura dies in jail. Fans of the original story may be interested in seeing how the modern aspect is executed, but otherwise this is a relatively uninspired yakuza film. It doesn't help that it's remarkably slow paced, originally intended as the first half of an epic; however, part 2 never surfaced. The biggest point of interest is probably setting some of the scenes in Paris. Sonny Chiba plays one of the gangsters, but his role is sadly very small and forgettable.
Yakuza's Song (Japan, 1963) [VoD] - 3.5/5
This is one of Chiba's best early starring roles, an enjoyable crossover between Toei's old fashioned yakuza cinema and the kind of youthful love story set in the criminal world you'd find in Nikkatsu's films. Sonny Chiba plays a low ranking yakuza who spends more time enjoying life than doing the yakuza work. He falls in love with a pretty student girl, whose brother (Saburo Kitajima) later gets drawn into the yakuza business against his own wishes. The film is charmingly old fashioned, utilizing many studio sets and Showa era music; however, the film's real strength is the breezy romance between Chiba and lovely Chiyoko Honma. Early/mid 60s was the time when Chiba was at his best as an actor, and here he finds just the right balance between youthful energy and seriousness. It also doesn't hurt the dressing department seems determined to make Chiba look as cool as possible, and that composer Tooru Funamura provides a cool, highly spaghetti esque score. The film may not add anything new to the genre, and the storyline is strictly standard stuff, but as an enjoyable programmer picture the film delivers!
