Onimasa: A Japanese Godfather (1982)
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A barkeeper saves a Yakuza boss' life and thus makes his way up in the organization. However, his fear of nothing soon causes problems.
To infiltrate a criminal organization responsible for the death of one of his colleagues, the Detective Tajima adopts the behavior of of a brutal thug and plays opposing yakuza bosses against each other.
After four years overseas, Shozo returns to Japan to avenge his yakuza boss who was assassinated by his own treacherous top man, Kurawaki. The resulting battle leaves both men severely injured, and Shozo awakens in a mysterious medical facility to find his arm replaced with an M61 Vulcan cannon and his leg replaced with a rocket launcher. Meanwhile, Kurawaki has been fitted with mechanical augmentations of his own. Get ready for the second round.
Shaolin warrior Tung Chien-chen is injured in battle against the hated Wu Tang clan, and nursed back to health by a knife-throwing master. As he recovers, Tung learns this deadly art, and also falls in love with his teacher's daughter. But when a Wu Tang attack disrupts the young lovers' wedding, Tung must put his new skill to use as he seeks revenge.
Sun Chung was already a valued comedy, romance, and modern crime filmmaker, when, through this tale of the 100 Poison Clique's obsessive ambition to destroy all rivals, he started bringing morality and motivation to martial arts movies like never before. Kung-fu superstar David Chiang and prominent choreographer Tang Chia lead the cast in a bloody clan clash centered on the trial of an admitted mass murderer and serial rapist. It was just the beginning of Sun Chung's exploration in emotion.
Mr. Soh, a righteous man with a cold stare and fists of steel, returns to a lawless post-war Japan in 1946. He protects the weak, defends the poor and knocks some good sense into friends and enemies alike. Rapists and gangsters get the worst of it, as Mr. Soh builds up his school on the island of Shikoku.
Near the end of the nineteenth century, as the balance of power shifts from Shogunate towards the Emperor, Japan restlessly awaits the dawning of a new age. But not all are content...The Shinsengumi, a small army of samurai, farmers and peasants, band together to do battle against the tide of history. Their leader, Isami Kondo (Mifune) is a man who rises from farmer to fighter to head the fierce Shinsengumi brigade. Using a stern hand and a heart of gold, he rallies his men in defense of the tottering Shogunate. But bloodshed and treachery lurk around every corner.
Nostalgia is Takashi Miikeâs favorite film of his considerable body of work. Including biographical elements, Nostalgia centers around the home and school of a young boy, whose family mix the violent and dysfunctional with the comic and the loveable. Though containing elements of the sudden and shocking brutality that many associate with this director, Young Thugs â Nostalgia is more concerned with a childâs moment of leaving the internalized world of fantasy, and passing on eagerly to the next stage of life. A wonderful, touching, startling vision that is uniquely Miikeâs.
The melancholy, homely Kamimura is a hit man who takes a job to kill a mob boss who's gotten greedy..
When the boss of a ruling Hong Kong triad is arrested and executed in China for counterfeiting money, mayhem ensues as the mob's leading contenders circle the throne.
Dangerous street fighter Kazuyoshi Tamai finds out that his rival, Takeshi, is the leader of a gang responsible for a series of assaults. Kazuyoshi is ready to face off against Takeshi, but comic challenges keep his nemesis out of reach. It's not until years later -- when Kazuyoshi becomes a championship boxer and Takeshi is a pro wrestler -- that they meet again in a battle that pits two combatants with very different fighting styles.
Retired mob boss Du-heon enrolls in a cooking class with the hopes of making a fresh start as a restaurant owner. In the class he meets a quirky girl, Se-bin, and finds himself drawn to her. Despite his determination to wipe the slate clean, Du-heon is summoned back into the criminal fold by his old colleagues.
Jimmy and Tiger are members of the Chinese national wushu team. The two are in Los Angeles to perform exhibitions. However, for Tiger, he plans to defect to L.A. to make a name for himself. When Jimmy learns of Tigers plan to defect, an attempt to stop him fails and Jimmy ends up missing his flight to China. Now a fish out of water, Jimmy's only hope is Andy, a wisecracking youngster in L.A. Meanwhile, Tiger works for a mafia boss. When Tiger loses a fortune in cocaine in a detergent box that Andy accidentally took, Andy and Jimmy soon have no choice but to face the wrath of Tiger and his men. Their only ally is Penny, the girlfriend of Tiger's boss. Two men who were once best friends have now become bitter enemies.
A Japanese assassin stranded in Taiwan must take work from a local crime boss to make ends meet when suddenly a woman from his past delivers a son to him.
Tough cop Ken Li (Cheng) is at the top of his game, but he's going to need some help to solve a grisly crime that the offender, a respected police officer, doesn't even remember committing. He seeks out Jack Lai (Lai), a former psychologist now in disgrace and behind bars, who has an uncanny ability to bend people to his will. Making an uneasy truce, this unconventional pair set out on a mission to find the man responsible, a master of hypnotism who will stop at nothing to get his revenge!
An adventure that delves into the dark caverns of the underworld and tells the tale of three chivalrous gangsters who attempt to escape the powerful clutch of their gang leader.
Chivalrous swordsman Jun-zhao (Kiu Chong) goes in search of a fugitive named Li Yueh (Jimmy Wang Yu) in order to reunite him with his love, Liu Xian (Chin Ping). Though the two men meet and become loyal brothers, Li does not reveal his true identity until Jun-zhaoâs life is endangered by swordsmen from Flying Fish Island who are looking for revenge.
A simple woodcutter named Wei Fu (Chang Yi) finds his world shattered when three murderous horsemen arrive to kill his family and kidnap his sister. Left with nothing but his motherâs bell-laden bracelet, he sets out to seek his revenge. Lucky for him, Wei Fu encounters a master swordsman (Yeung Chi-hing), who takes him under his wing.
The Yu family earn the ire of the Green Dragon clan when the daughter (Cheng Pei-Pei) kills the clan chief's son (a rapist and murderer). The Green Dragon chief wounds family head Yu Yuan with his flying daggers, and kills many others who try to protect the noble family. Wandering swordsman Ying Qing (Lo Lieh) saves the family in a fight, using his own flying dagger skills, but his allegiances and motives are unclear.
In this hilarious mockumentary, middle-aged Daisato (Hitoshi Matsumoto) -- a second-rate, third-generation superhero -- annoys his neighbors with the noise and destruction he causes on the job. But a heroic public image is the least of his concerns. Besides defending Japan from bizarre monsters, he must deal with an agent seeking to brand him with ads, a superhero grandfather with Alzheimer's and a family embarrassed by his incompetence.
The film is set in early 11th century China during the reign of Emperor Renzong of the Song Dynasty. The emperor neglects state affairs and indulges in personal pleasures, while the government sinks into corruption and war continues to rage on at the borders of the Song Dynasty. The Song Dynasty is being invaded by the armies of the rival state of Western Xia. Yang Zongbao is the last man standing in the Yang clan, a family of generals who have dedicated their lives to defending the Song Dynasty from foreign invaders. He apparently dies in battle tragically when the treacherous Imperial Tutor Pang refuses to send reinforcements to aid him. Yang Zongbao's widowed wife Mu Guiying leads the other widows of the Yang clan into battle to continue the legacy of their husbands.
In the second film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, Ogami Itto battles a group of female ninja in the employ of the Yagyu clan and must assassinate a traitor who plans to sell his clan's secrets to the Shogunate.
Jackie Chan stars as the young warrior Hsu Yiu Fong. Hsu has been entrusted with the book of the "Art of the Snake and Crane," after the mysterious disappearance of the eight Shaolin Masters who had written it. He must fight off numerous clans who are all attempting to steal the book from him, to find out the true reason for the disappearance of the Shaolin Masters.
In this first film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, adapted from the manga by Kazuo Koike, we are told the story of the Lone Wolf and Cub's origin. Ogami Itto, the official Shogunate executioner, has been framed for disloyalty to the Shogunate by the Yagyu clan, against whom he now is waging a one-man war, along with his infant son, Daigoro.
Years of warfare end in a Japan unified under the Tokugawa shogunate, and samurai spy Sasuke Sarutobi, tired of conflict, longs for peace. When a high-ranking spy named Tatewaki Koriyama defects from the shogun to a rival clan, however, the world of swordsmen is thrown into turmoil. After Sasuke is unwittingly drawn into the conflict, he tracks Tatewaki, while a mysterious, white-hooded figure seems to hunt them both. By taleâs end, no one is who they seemed to be, and the truth is far more personal than anyone suspected. Director Masahiro Shinodaâs Samurai Spy, filled with clan intrigue, ninja spies, and multiple double crosses, marks a bold stylistic departure from swordplay film convention.
A tale of deadly deception and betrayal unfolds when the leader of the respectable Iron Flag clan is assassinated by The Spearman while the clan fights the villainous Eagle clan. Iron Flag's eldest brother, Lo, the second brother accepts the responsibility for the deaths of the Eagle clan and goes into hiding from the authorities. Meanwhile, Chow Feng takes charge, using his position for disreputable purposes. Seeing Lo, as a potential threat, Feng sends the "nefarious" Ten Killers of the Underworld to finish him. But Lo defeats them and confronts Feng with the aid of The Spearman who hopes to atone for having unwittingly killed a righteous man, Iron Flag's former leader.
The Japanese yakuza films certainly have a well-earned reputation of being violent and chaotic. Some are more frenetic than others and Street Mobster is unbelievable high on savagery and energy. It dawned the re-birth of the genre, telling the story of low-level punks who will do anything without compromise and little sense of honor.
Legendary swordplay filmmaker Hideo Goshaâs Sword of the Beast chronicles the flight of the low-level swordsman Gennosuke, who kills one of his ministers as part of a reform plot. His former comrades then turn on him, and this betrayal so shakes his sense of honor that he decides to live in the wild, like an animal. There he joins up with a motley group who are illegally mining the shogunâs gold, and, with the aid of another swordsman, gets a chance not just at survival but to recover his name and honor.
Sun Chung had made a name for himself directing satirical comedies and modern day crime thrillers when he started exploring the kung-fu genre with this fascinating tale which mixes music and martial arts. Revered choreographer Tang Chia leads a great action cast (including "Dirty Ho" - Wang Yu, and award-winning actor - Ku Feng) in a tale of conflicting clans and a mysterious song called "The Proud One" which leads to slowly blossoming love as well as sudden death.
âTattooed Life' begins with a parasol wielding Yakuza assassin attacking a rickshaw. It almost looks like feudal Japan until somebody pulls a gun and we're reminded that it's the 20th century. Post-shooting, the assassin delivers his bounty to his brother (to pay for his art school education) before getting ambushed in one of the few rickshaw-jacking incidents in film history, and being rescued by his art-student brother. In the aftermath, one brother is marked for death by the Yakuza, and the other brother won't go to art school with blood on his hands, so they decide the perfect way to deal with such hardships is to become fugitive construction workers in northern Japan . And why not?
On his release from prison a young yakuza, along with his brother, decides to turn his back on criminal life instead of taking over the position of his recently deceased father, boss of the Asahina clan. But their exit proves more difficult than planned when their rival clan steps in to exact revenge.
After Kunisada's Yakuza leader and father figure is brutally murdered, he and his best friend go on a two-man mission to avenge his death, killing other Yakuza leaders leading to a final confrontation by the old man's killers..
Sunny is a naïve circus performer who dreams of inheriting his father's knife-throwing skills. However, his hostile colleagues continue to bully him, relegating him to a lowly clown. On a tour to Malaysia, Cheung and other performers discover a cave occupied by the Japanese army during World War II. Instead of finding treasure, the performers - including Sunny - are sprayed with a mysterious chemical that turns them into superhuman mutants...
In at least 6 movies by director Kinji Fukasaku, Bunta Sugawara played a yakuza thug. This time, he carries a badge but his character hasn't lost his distaste for double-dealing bosses and authority figures who are out to cover their own butts. Detective Kuno is balanced between the law and pragmatism. Cops didn't enforce the law to the point of pushing gangsters over the edge. In return, the gangsters mostly stayed out of the public eye. Some of them even became friends with cops, sharing a mutual desire to keep-down trade unions and leftists. When that balance is upset, Kuno has to decide where his loyalties lie. In this gray world, cops aren't always good and gangsters are thoroughly bad.. although there's no reward for good men who drink from the cup of corruption. "Cops Versus Thugs" has that trademark Fukasaku camera-work.. constantly moving, zooming, and putting you right in the middle of the action, changing loyalties and political maneuvering between cops and criminals.
Muraki, a hardboiled Yakuza gangster, has just been released from prison after serving a sentence for murder. Revisiting his old gambling haunts, he meets Saeko, a striking young upper-class woman who is out seeking thrills, and whose presence adds spice to the staid masculine underworld rituals. Muraki becomes her mentor while simultaneously coping with the shifts of power that have affected the gangs while he was interred. When he notices a rogue, drug-addicted young punk hanging around the gambling dens, he realizes that Saeko's insatiable lust for intense pleasures may be leading her to self-destruction.
In this uncompromising vision of the gritty Korean underworld, a crystal meth dealer with a tragic past is forced to team up with a renegade cop to take down a powerful crime lord. Reminiscent of the Hong Kong action films of the 80âs but full of the dark and unpredictable machismo of Korean cinema today, Bloody Ties is a sinister and vicious film noir thriller.
An expert swordsman is suspected of being the thief of a treasure sent to Emperor. The swordsman who has nothing to do with the theft investigates and is led on the trail of the supernatural "Bloody Parrot". This leads to the "Parrot Brothel" and the star prostitute who walks around half naked. Strange things happen including a demonic possession, witches casting poison spells, disgusting autopsies and numerous sword fights. Then a dead constable turns into a vampire! This is all in the first 30 minutes!
The film revolves around five individual characters and the events in their life, that, on the one hand, changes everything in their respective lives, which the film's title refers to, and, on the other hand, also brings together these people. It is an anthology film, that contains two parallel moving stories, which are connected by a freak accident in Chennai. A young architect, falls in love with a young beautiful pediatric doctor, runs after her and tries to convince her to marry her, while, simultaneously, a morose ex-football coach troubles a software engineer by vowing to kill his eight-year-old son. How these characters get connected and confronted through the accident forms the crux of the story.
Harold, a prosperous English gangster, is about to close a lucrative new deal when bombs start showing up in very inconvenient places. A mysterious syndicate is trying to muscle in on his action, and Harold wants to know who they are. He finds out soon enough, and bloody mayhem ensues.
Born Free (1966) is an Open Road Films Ltd./Columbia Pictures feature film starring Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers as Joy and George Adamson, a real-life couple who raised an orphaned lion cub to adulthood, and released her into the wilds of Kenya.
Story of a tumultuous and complex relationship between a father (Mohan Agashe) and son (Ajay Devgan), set against the backdrop of a thriving kidnapping industry in the Hindi heartland of Bihar.
"A family is kidnapped by a couple who have guns. Wandering lost, they get together in a place where there are zombies in samurai armor. Encountering zombies and police, reunited family struggle and get to confront a tragic secret. A fun action-horror on the low budget B-movie."
An African immigrant bank security guard turns the tables on Dublin's nastiest criminals when they force him to be the "inside man" on a bank robbery.
The head of an elite Hong Kong surveillance unit (Simon Yam) keeps one eye on his rookie apprentice (Kate Tsui) and the other on a notorious criminal (Tony Leung Ka Fai) he suspects of masterminding a recent jewel heist in this tense thriller from filmmaking duo Johnnie To and Nai-Hoi Yau. Of course, the criminal knows all along he's being watched. But that doesn't stop him from trying to pull off the biggest score of his career.
One rainy night in the Edo period, Kotono (a geisha) confronts samurais who killed her father. The samurais attack her one after another, but she fights hard against samurais with her sword. Kotono tries to chase the samurais who scramble to escape. Yet now three ninjas stand up against her. Kotono drops her sword by their wave of assaults. Can she beat them?
A guilt-haunted samurai warrior attempts to stop a massacre taking place.
A police officer adopts the son and sole survivor of a family he has massacred while pursuing a terrorist. After some time the foster son finds out what the stepfather did.
The lord of the Oshi fief is killed by his trespassing neighbour, the cruel and despotic Nariatsu, son of the former Shogun. After an investigation, the Oshi clan is blamed for what happened and sentenced to be disbanded. Eleven of the best samurai of the clan refuse the sentence and are willing to give their life for justice.
During the raging war between the Toyotomi and Tokugawa clans, the swordsman Mohei (whose family has been completely decimated) is recruited by Toyotomi to overcome the seat of power, Osaka Castle. Mohei's daredevil skills will be put to severe tests.
As Japan gears up for the 1964 Olympic games, the cops start to crack down under pressure from the public and the press, adding a new dimension in the war for power among the yakuza families of Hiroshima. Akira Kobayashi's Takeda tries to keep a lid on things, but hotheaded underlings create chaos, with one boss whacked in neutral territory, and the craven boss, Uchimoto, informing on an assassination attempt by his own minions. While the police round up hundreds of yakuza foot soldiers, Bunta Sugawara's Shozo Hirono plots to finally take out longtime nemesis, boss Yamamori.
As sadomasochistic yakuza enforcer Kakihara searches for his missing boss he comes across Ichi, a repressed and psychotic killer who may be able to inflict levels of pain that Kakihara has only dreamed of.
The sensitive swordsman Cho Yi-Hang is tired of his life. He is the unwilling successor to the Wu-Tang clan throne and the unsure commander of the clan's forces in a war against foreign tribes and an evil cult. One day, he meets the beautiful Lien, a killer for the evil cult who is equally unsatisfied with her situation, but their love angers both the Wu-Tang clan and the evil cult.
Kitano plays Murakawa, a Tokyo yakuza tiring of gangster life. Along with a few of his henchmen, he is sent by his boss to Okinawa to help end a gang war, supposedly to mediate between two warring clans. He finds that the dispute between the clans is insignificant and whilst wondering why he was sent to Okinawa at all, Murakawa's headquarters are bombed and he and his gang are ambushed in a bar.
Deewaar is a 1975 Indian crime-drama film directed by Yash Chopra, written by Salim-Javed, and starring Amitabh Bachchan and Shashi Kapoor. Reflecting the tumultuous politics of the early 70s in India, Deewaar tells the story of a pair of impoverished brothers who, after their family is betrayed by the misplaced idealism of their father, struggle to survive on the streets of Mumbai.
Three centuries ago, a precious sword has been stolen by Kazamatsuri -- the sword, which historic and symbolic value is priceless for the clan (Shogun Tokugawa donated it to clan 80 years before that, at the same time that he established them as the local rulers). Lord's counselor's young son Heishiro goes to retrieve the sword himself to protect the clan from the shame or possible demise. He is accompanied with two friends, Shintaro and Tadasuke, and followed by the ninjas of the clan. After Kazamatsuri wounds Heishiro and kills one of his friends, the young aristocrat still wants revenge more than sword itself, but meanwhile have to recover from his wounds, in the small forest house of a lonely samurai and his daughter. At the same time, Kamazatsuri stays in nearby town in the entertainment center run by Okatsu and falls into her. The older samurai tries to dissuade Heishiro from fighting with Kamazatsuri, but is himself gradually drawn into the conflict.
Peace in 17th-century Japan causes the Shogunate's breakup of warrior clans, throwing thousands of samurai out of work and into poverty. An honorable end to such fate under the samurai code is ritual suicide, or hara-kiri.
The incomparable Toshiro Mifune stars in Akira Kurosawaâs visually stunning and darkly comic Yojimbo. To rid a terror-stricken village of corruption, wily masterless samurai Sanjuro turns a range war between two evil clans to his own advantage. Remade twice, by Sergio Leone and Walter Hill, this exhilarating genre-twister remains one of the most influential and entertaining films of all time.
In this pitch-black action comedy by Kihachi Okamoto, a pair of down-on-their-luck swordsmen arrive in a dusty, windblown town, where they become involved in a local clan dispute. One, previously a farmer, longs to become a noble samurai. The other, a former samurai haunted by his past, prefers living anonymously with gangsters. But when both men discover the wrongdoings of the nefarious clan leader, they side with a band of rebels who are under siege at a remote mountain cabin. Based on the same source novel as Akira Kurosawaâs Sanjuro, Kill! playfully tweaks samurai film convention, borrowing elements from established chanbara classics and seasoning them with a little Italian western.
When an evil emperor executes their leader, his band of knights â bound by duty and honour â embarks on a journey of vengeance that will not come to an end until they've destroyed their mortal foe.
The final chapter of the Hibotan Bakuto series. Oryu the Red Peony visits an old dying Boss of an ally family and promised her that she would help guide the new Boss. Meanwhile a turf war breaks out. When the family is betrayed from within and the rival family becomes violent, Oryu takes things into her own handsâ¦
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