Kanto Wanderer

It seems that 1963 was something of a watershed year for director Seijun Suzuki since he made four films and two are particularly notable as signature films Youth of Beast and Kanto Wanderer. It is also important to point out this is also the year he began collaborating with set designer Takeo Kimura-who was responsible for the new daring, lurid, and racy backgrounds that consistently appear in the films of Suzuki from 1963 on. This film is a traditional ninkyo (traditional heroes vs. Progressive villains) yakuza story that has been dropped in modern Tokyo. The yakuza wear kimono and use samurai swords, but it also has the modern blight of the early 60s before the economic miracle has cleaned up the blight as well as sailor suite clad school girls with crushes on yakuza. It is also a star vehicle for Akira Kobayashi who wears arch kabuki-like make-up around his eyes and a theatrical scar (would this influence Oshima in Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence). The scene above is an example of the Suszuki-Kimura collaboration where after killing two trouble makers in a gambling den the walls pulled down revealing red which is a color code for the red prison uniform for the fate that awaits the killer (as opposed to white-the color of death which is also used in the film). There are several other striking visual scenes such as Kobayashi walking in the falling snow as well as several classically framed scenes in traditional homes and elsewhere. It is an early classic and representative of the kind of films that would follow in the future.