When people ask me what my most favorite movie is, I envitably shock them by saying The Yakuza, starring Robert Mitchum and Takakura Ken. They shake their heads in confusion and say, "What?"
The film came out in 1975 and was directed by the late, great Sidney Pollack, and written by Paul and Leonard Schrader with a rewrite by Robert Towne. As good as this movie is, few people saw it then, unless you happened to be a martial artist (Karate, Judo, Kendo, etc.), or a big fan of the late Robert Mitchum.
I was both.
Needless to say, I didn't know what to expect when I went to the theater that night by myself. I'd seen the trailer for it, and the Japanese swordfighting had triggered my interest. The movie ended up having such an emotional affect on me, I stayed for the second feature and watched it again, enjoying it even more. When the film eventually came out on VHS several years later, I bought a copy. The same was done with the DVD. It took nearly thirty years before the soundtrack to the film was made and released. I got a copy of that, too. I think only one or two thousand copies of the CD were ever printed.
Through the last quarter of a century, I've watched this film at least twice a year. I do that because I not only enjoy this movie immensely and its particular message about obligation and honor, but also because I need it for my soul and to remember what's truly important in life. We often get so caught up in going to work, making a living. raising a family, paying the bills, and just surviving on a day-to-day basis that we tend to forget it's our actions that make us who we are for better or worse. This movie helps me to remember.
There will be some spoilers ahead, so continue on at your own risk.
The movie, The Yakuza, deals with Harry Kilmer (played by Robert Mitchum), who lived in Japan right after World War II and stayed there during the occupation as a member of the military police. While performing his duties, Kilmer became aware of a Japanese woman (Eiko) who was running contraband and was nearly killed in a squirmish. Harry Kilmer saved her life and soon fell in love with her. He sought to marry Eiko so he could take care of her and her daughter, but she gently refused the idea of marriage and would only live with him.
Where her brother, Tanaka Ken (played by Takakura Ken), returned to Japan after hiding in the caves of the Philippines for six years, Eiko broke off her relationship with Harry and refused to see him. Her brother felt she has degraced him by placing him in debt to Harry (the enemy) for saving her and taking care of her and the child for so many years. Anyway, Harry borrowed five thousand dollars from his Army buddy, George Tanner (played by Brian Keith), and purchased Eiko a small bar in the business section of Tokyo, which she named Kilmer House. It was his way of saying goodbye to her.
Twenty years later, George Tanner's (he still has strong business dealings in Japan) daughter is kidnapped by a Yakuza clan in retaliation for taking their money to buy guns with and then losing it on the stock market. They threaten to cut up his daughter into little pieces unless he flies back to Japan to settle the dispute. Tanner turns to Harry Kilmer for help. It seems that Eiko's brother, Tanaka Ken, later joined the Yakuza after Harry left Japan and became highly successful as the youngest leader of a clan. George knows that Tanaka Ken owes Harry a debt that can never be repaid and wants Harry to call in the marker to help save his daughter.
Returning to Japan to rescue Tanner's daughter, Harry is accompanied by Dusty, the son of a former Army buddy and now Tanner's personal bodyguard. Harry thinks Dusty is there to help him, but it's actually to keep an eye on his actions. Both Tanner and Dusty know Harry's knowledge of Japan could create more problems than he solves by rescuring Tanner's daughter.
Harry soon meets with Tanaka Ken in Kyoto at the Kendo hall, only to find out the man is no longer Yakuza and has very little power to help him. Still, Ken owes Harry a debt that never be repaid and so agrees to assist him, understanding he will more than likely incur the wrath of the Yakuza for inferring. Of course, Tanner's daughter is rescued, but now the Yakuza wants Harry's and Ken's heads as payback for what they did. The Yakuza comes after Ken's sister and her daughter. Harry quickly decides to stay in Tokyo and help Ken to fight the Yakuza, understanding he might die in the process, but also feeling a debt to Ken for what he did. Together, both men will take on the major Yakuza clan in an epic battle of bullets, swords, blood and death--two men against twenty-five.
What makes this movie great is not the fantastic swordfighting battle between Ken and the Yakuza henchmen who work for his adversary, but rather the dichotomy between Harry, Eiko, and himself. Harry loves Eiko and has never stopped in all the years they've been apart. He still wants to marry her; and, though Eiko loves him, she refuses. Harry knows that Ken hates him, but believes the animonsity between them was brought on when Japan lost the war. What Harry doesn't discover until the night of the final battle is that Eiko is really Ken's wife and not his sister. Ken came back from the Philippines after the war, only to find his wife living with an American soldier. He wanted to kill Harry Kilmer, but on the other hand he was in debt to Kilmer-san for saving his wife and daughter from certain death during the occupation. Ken has been a deeply tormented man for over two decades.
Harry understands Japan well enough to realize he unintentionally destroyed Ken's past, and now he's destroyed his future, too. After the climatic battle is over, Harry makes the decision to ask Ken to forgive him in the only acceptable manner to balance out the gulf of pain and suffering he caused. It's the next-to-final scene in the movie between Kilmer-san and Tanaka Ken that shifts this film from being a very good movie to a great one. From being enemies, both men now become the closest of friends who have shared a deep, unrelenting bond that can never be broken.
I personally feel this is the best movie Robert Mitchum ever did during his long career as an actor. It's certainly Takakura Ken's best film. This movie has so much meaning on so many levels that it takes repeated viewings to fully comprehend the subtle essences in each scene. More importantly, the film demonstrates a man must pay his debts, and it is only through this action that he can call himself a man. So often we go through life never fully realizing the affect our actions have on others and the pain and suffering we sometimes cause. When knowledge of this comes to us, if it ever does, it's our duty and responsibility to make amends in whatever way we can. This is the code of Bushido. It is the way honorable men live and die.
The DVD of The Yakuza has a behind-the-scenes featurette and a commentary by Sidney Pollack before he died.
This is a film I highly recommend.
Geri.
The Japanese term for debt or obligation. It also means the burdon hardest to bear. Such is life.
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