Outlaw: Goro The Assassin

Keiichi Ozawa's fourth installment of the Outlaw Gangster series Outlaw: Goro The Assassin (1968) is one of the best of the series so far. Goro (Tetsuya Watari) is released from jail and his friend Masa dies a few days later asking to Goro to deliver a message to his sister, Shinobu (Chitose Kobayashi). He gets a job as a repairman in the hotel that his romantic interest, Yuki (Chieko Matsubara-always a new character in this saga...), works in. He encounters some yakuza who hassle her and befriends her. Meanwhile, he is searching the red light district for Masa's sister-this requires attending strip shows and visiting brothels to find her. Of course these stories intersect as the yakuza are involved in both situations. There's some inspired cinematography and lots of violence as usual with a dash of salaciousness-a nod to where much of cinema will go in the 70s when movies have to compete with TV. There fore they need to show what can't bee seen on TV to attract their audiences. This one is also notable for the Nagoya location, a place akin to Detroit as there were major car manufacturing factories and other production facilities in this city. The romantic interest, Yuki is from Mie prefecture on a peninsula to the south of the city at the port of Toba. Toba is known for oysters and pearls and some action takes place at a port there at the end.