After a prolific and tumultuous ten years of work in the Japanese studio system in which Seijun Suzuki refined his methods of transforming standard B-movie plots, scripts and budgets into highly stylized explorations of creative possibilities and spectacular send-ups of familiar crime film tropes, Tokyo Drifter turned out to be the project that put him squarely on the precipice of being blacklisted by the Japanese film industry. His departure (which effectively postponed his career for the following decade) wouldn't actually occur until the following year, following the defiant insubordination that fueled Branded to Kill, but Tokyo Drifter definitely shows him careening wildly toward that that fateful, decisive bend in the road, wheels sliding into the gravel, threatening to fly off into oblivion at any moment.
With each subsequent film that Suzuki directed throughout the early 1960s, his incorporation of eccentric styles and disruptive ideas grew more problematic, creating fascinating and maddeningly beautiful impediments to the presumably mainstream commercial offerings that his producers at Nikkatsu Studios expected from him. Beginning with Youth of the Beast, it almost seems like Suzuki was growing bored and restless with the formulaic material sent his way, and who can blame him for wanting to lend a more personal touch to the films that bore his name? Subsequent titles like Gate of Flesh and Story of a Prostitute eventually proved distinctively "important" enough to win the admiration of later generations of cinephiles (and their respective places in the Criterion Collection) but they also generated increasingly stern warnings and imposed limitations in his budgets and resources from the studio bosses who disapproved of his free-wheeling experimentalism. So from all reports, and the evidence we have in hand in this film, an epic power struggle ensued, pitting the visionary artist on the one side against the forces of a prudent and ultimately stifling entertainment industry establishment on the other.
Echoes of that escalating clash of egos can be detected in Tokyo Drifter's plot, involving a young hitman named Tetsu, an unquestioningly loyal enforcer for a yakuza gang whose boss is looking to move beyond his old criminal ways and become a legitimate mainstream business enterprise. The old man Kurata is presumably getting tired of staying one step ahead of the law, looking for a way to reduce the risk of violence that could end his career as well as his life at the next deal gone bad. One way of proving the sincerity of this conversion is shown in the film's opening scene, a brutal beatdown that Tetsu endures at the hands of four sharp-dressed thugs who are equally astonished and appalled at his passive demonstration of the gang's renunciation of violent retribution.
But a rival mob, the Otsuka crew, senses an opportunity to take advantage of the perceived weakness as the old man lets his guard down. A shrewd bit of betrayal allows Otsuka to put Kurata in a highly compromised position, moving in to disrupt the plans, nearly bankrupt his adversary and put Tetsu's loyalty to the ultimate test. Old man Kurata's most trusted bodyguard and unswerving devotee, Tetsu has to flee for his life to a remote city in the south of Japan as he becomes a hunted man, pursued by the deadliest assassins that Otsuka can muster in order to eliminate the threat that Tetsu represents to his newly expanded criminal domain. In the process of leaving behind his father figure Kurata, the comforts offered to him by Chiharu, the beautiful nightclub singer who loves him, and the sense of purpose and honor that had propelled him into so many life-endangering situations, Tetsu becomes, against his own ideals and illusions, the Tokyo Drifter, a modern-day ronin whose cruel experience forces him to accept some bitter truths.
So it's not too difficult to see how Suzuki himself, who churned out an astounding 40 feature films between 1956 and 1967, undoubtedly creating much more wealth for Nikkatsu than he ever shared in and sacrificing his artistic integrity at various points along the way, might have identified with the world-weary protagonist of his tale, betrayed so cruelly by the bosses he had faithfully served, but who ultimately cast him aside when the chips were down. And I'm sure that most who appreciate the film similarly have no trouble applying it to some aspect of our own story, in which we've given much more for the sake of a cause, a belief, a relationship, than what we received in return. Still, it's not so much the message of Tokyo Drifter that lingers in the memory, it's the magnificently creative and stylish coolness with which the story is told.
Here's a pixely rendition (with German subtitles) of the original trailer that doesn't come anywhere close to doing justice to the film's vibrance and vitality, but at least offers a few hints at the delights that await:
And here's a thrashy J-Punk cover version of the incredibly infection theme song, not so catchy here, imo, but it makes better use of the wondrous visuals that Suzuki and his crew cobbled together on their shoe-string budget:
The primary charm of Tokyo Drifter resides in Suzuki's intensely expressive inflation of so many conventions that we've come to expect and appreciate when watching low-budget action films. The emotions run hot, the fistfights and gun battles are viciously blunt, to the point of absurdity and beyond, the visual environments are dazzling to the eye but also remarkably ascetic and dreamlike at the same time, as lighting effects and camera tricks are employed to seduce us into a happy complacency that allows us to overlook the cheap knock-off limitations of what the crew and cast had to work with. Even basic rules of cinema like narrative continuity and plausible conclusions to extremely dangerous scenarios are blatantly ignored, but rather than triggering an outburst of frustration at his cheating, we're moved to celebrate Suzuki's ingenuity as well as his reckless abandon. His daring and his audacity are so over the top that we can hardly hold it against him when he pushes our incredulity over the top - indeed, we applaud his nerve and hope that he continues to top himself with one outrageous situation after another over the course of Tokyo Drifter's brisk 82 minute sprint through the yakuza underworld. In that sense, the film taps into the exact same zeitgeist that gave the old Batman TV series (on Blu-ray, my most cherished Christmas gift from this past holday season) its irresistibly timeless appeal, both then and now. They're zany, bold trips into a cartoonish world that's not at all hesitant to blast its simplistic but craftily evocative morality tales into our brains using the most garish color palette at their creators' disposal.
Next: Patriotism