WOLVES, PIGS, AND MEN (1964) • Frame Rated

Wolves, Pigs, and Men / 狼と豚と人間 / Ōkami to buta to ningen is cited as one of the more important Japanese post-war films, but its initial release had even less impact than director Kinji Fukasaku’s nine previous movies. It’s said that it screened to mostly empty theatres. In retrospect, both the film and its director are recognised for revitalising the Japanese crime genre with the radical, edgy, ultraviolent energy it is now associated with. So, this 60th-anniversary presentation from Eureka Entertainment is a most welcome addition to their prestigious ‘Masters of Cinema’ marque. Restored from the original film elements, supplied by Toei, this new Blu-ray also constitutes the movie’s much belated UK debut.

A significant factor in its poor public reception was its time of release, in August 1964, during the run-up to the historic Tokyo Olympics, which occupied everyone’s attention that year. It was the first time the Olympiad had been hosted in Asia, and Japan was pouring vast resources into a radical improvement scheme that was reconfiguring its capital city and creating a Tokyo-centric boom. In addition to rapid development, the world-famous Tōkaidō Shinkansen bullet train service was launched as part of the Olympic preparation, showcasing Japanese design and technology. It was perceived as a beacon of Japan’s post-war hope and prosperity—the pinnacle of its economic recovery and cultural renewal.

It was no less than a proclamation of a new national identity. This was particularly pertinent because Japan had been set to host the 1940 Summer Olympics, but that honour was revoked when Imperial Japan invaded China in 1937. So, it wasn’t surprising that a film like Wolves, Pigs, and Men, with its uncompromisingly brutal and socially critical content, would be ignored as the antithesis of what the Olympics represented. In a time of hope, Kinji Fukasaku delivered a dark, misanthropic movie about economic disparity, giving voice to the severely underprivileged people of Tokyo who had been pushed further to the margins during the unprecedented economic explosion.

The story concerns the different fortunes of three brothers who grew up in the slums of Edogawa Town, which had been expanded by the so-called ‘Island of Dreams’, Yumenoshima, an artificial land extension into Tokyo Bay created by refuse. Dumping started in 1939 with the original plan of creating enough surface area for a second airport. This idea was abandoned after the war, and the waste ground was claimed by the impoverished to build a ramshackle shanty town while it continued to grow around them with more waste from the rapidly expanding city, which, by the mid-1960s, was the biggest metropolis in the world.

The middle brother, Jirô (Ken Takakura), returns to the slums after being away for some years. It’s unclear if he spent some time in prison or has simply been a drifter, trapped in a life of petty crime. The older brother, Kuroki (Rentarô Mikuni), is a ‘made man’ holding a high enough rank in the local yakuza organisation to be put in charge of Club Phoenix. Both brothers have gone their separate ways without a second thought for their youngest sibling, Sabu (Kin’ya Kitaôji), who they left behind, caring for their elderly and ailing mother.

The scenes of shacks built amid what is literally a wasteland recall the devastation in the aftermath of wartime bombing, and the symptoms of the mother’s terminal illness allude to long-term radiation sickness. I don’t think there’s a Kinji Fukasaku film that doesn’t reference the nuclear holocaust, and that can even be said of his frivolous sci-fi frolic Message from Space (1978). It is their mother’s death that brings the three estranged brothers together again, though there is no love or respect among them.

Ken Takakura is cast against type here as he was already well-known for starring in ninkyo eiga—chivalrous yakuza movies–in which he invariably played the strong, stoic masculine hero with an unwavering sense of purpose, enduring hardship and injury but finally pushing through to ensure justice prevailed. Usually after removing his shirt. He would play that part twice in two of the first three Valiant Red Peony (1968-69) films. Audiences loved that story, but it had been done so many times. Yet the jitsuroku eiga—a genre of gritty gangster films, usually based on real events—had not yet emerged, though Wolves, Pigs and Men effectively provided a prototype.

Jirô and his girlfriend Kyoko (Sanae Nakahara) dream of escaping their life of crime, but they have limited options. At the time, there were restrictions on international travel, and anyone with a criminal record had no hope of leaving the country via normal channels. If only they had enough money to buy new identities and escape via Hong Kong to start a new life abroad. Jirô has caught wind of a big-time yakuza drugs deal that’s about to go down in plain sight at Shibuya station, involving the exchange of ¥40 million for the corresponding value in drugs. He sees the opportunity to swipe both the cash and drugs, intending to be out of the country under an assumed identity before the yakuza tracks him down. For such an audacious operation, he’ll need a crew, preferably an expendable one. He calls on his young brother, Sabu, who has gathered his own gang of juvenile delinquents. Jirô offers them a measly ¥50K each, though it’s unclear if he intends to pay anything at all.

The heist is a superbly staged sequence that truly shows off Kinji Fukasaku’s excellent visual literacy and mastery of the camera. Of course, with their meagre budget, they couldn’t afford to close one of the busiest train stations in the world. Instead, he sought permission to film there during a normal day. To do this, they had to keep camera set-ups relatively contained and out of the way so as not to create obstructions. Although there were probably notices, the majority of commuters would’ve been oblivious. So, when Sabu’s hoodlums kick off and start fighting as a distraction, the reactions of the crowd all around are largely genuine. This is a form of what is known as ‘invisible theatre’—when an engineered happening occurs in public without announcing that it’s being played out by actors. The design and editing of the sequence are slick and efficient, evoking the heightened sense of an adrenaline rush with a rapid rate of cuts, lots of dynamic, cantilevered angles and tight cropping.

In the confusion, Jirô and his partner in crime Mizuhara (Shinjirô Ebara) hold the yakuza men at gunpoint after effectively blindfolding them with opaque sunglasses. Sabu and his accomplice, Maku (Hiroko Shima) grab the drugs and cash and run. However, after seeing the value of the haul, Sabu feels that he and his crew have been duped and loses all trust in his brother. Instead of meeting at the agreed rendezvous, he hides the takings in a place that only he knows. Of course, Jirô is furious and tracks the young gang down back to their hangout in the slums of the ‘Island of Dreams’.

After nearly beating his brother to death while failing to make him talk, he realises that they are just as tough as each other yet he suspects that Sabu still feels comradery for the friends that he grew up with. He tests his resolve by holding them all hostage in the shack and torturing them one by one in the full knowledge that they have no idea where the cash and drugs are hidden. He bets on their screams of agony being too much for his brother to bear. The level of calculated brutality would’ve been shocking at the time and is still difficult to watch—making one glad the film was shot in black and white. However, it’s the well-honed performances all around that truly sell the cruelty and defiant resilience.

Meanwhile, the yakuza have tasked Kuroki with resolving the situation and recovering the loot. He’s told, in no uncertain terms, that this is the only way to redeem his standing within the organisation. It does not take him long to figure out his brothers were involved and guess where he might find them. From that point forward, the narrative proceeds towards its inevitable conclusion just like the lives of most of those born in the slums of Edogawa.

Kinji Fukasaku was influenced by the social commentary and verité style of Italian neo-realism, along with some of the noirish affectations of the French nouvelle vague, by way of Japan’s own Nagisa Ôshima who was at the vanguard of nuberu bagu—Japan’s new wave. The shanty town in Ôshima’s feature debut, A Town of Love and Hope / 愛と希望の街 / Ai to kibō no machi (1962) had been shot in the same sprawling slums. That title, though suitably ironic, was added by the distributors—the film is ultimately devoid of both love and hope.

It served as a template for a new generation of Japanese directors making socially critical films that espoused nihilism as a form of moral resistance. Refusal to acquiesce, even when facing death, is the only weapon available to the powerless underdog in a no-win situation. The best way to go out is the one that most hurt the oppressors. This became a recurring theme in the crime cinema of Japan and the trope was to spread through Italian and American cinema of the late-1960s and early-1970s.

That such films found a young audience in Japan was an indicator of the dissatisfaction remaining among certain strata of society, along with the fresh legacy of the ‘Anpo struggle’ that had erupted in mass demonstrations during 1959. This was an ongoing protest against the renewal of the U.S.-Japan Mutual Security Treaty. The escalation of civil unrest culminated in 1960, leading to the cancellation of a state visit from the President of the USA, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and the resignation of Nobusuke Kishi, Japan’s conservative Prime Minister. That same year, Japan witnessed the graphically violent death of Inejirō Asanuma, leader of the Socialist Party, who was assassinated during a televised live debate. He was attacked and killed by a far-right nationalist using a traditional wakizashi short sword, bringing shockingly real violence to the screen. Likewise, just a year before Wolves, Pigs and Men, the assassination of John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963 was broadcast live to the world and seemed to presage more realistic portrayals of violent death in cinema.

Many counterculture films being made in Europe during the 1960s centred on young protagonists, and these movies appealed to the age group they represented. Due to the post-war population explosion in Japan, youth were a large demographic that also had some spending power. Films of the taiyozoku genre featuring delinquent street gangs and wild teenagers became very popular. This may be why the youth gang led by Sabu have a couple of scenes in which they almost parody such teen movies, breaking into song or dancing incongruously but energetically in their squalid hangout while the dog is simmering.

The harrowing scene where Sabu and his gang hunt stray dogs to provision the feast may well have carried a political charge at the time. In the run-up to the Olympics, Tokyo had been largely sanitised, and there was a concerted effort to round up and destroy the many stray dogs that roamed the streets. The only stray dogs that escaped this cull were the ones on the vast refuse island, which would not be seen by the influx of international guests and tourists. Like those dogs, the people who lived on ‘Dream Island’ were also forgotten, overlooked, and out of sight.

Although I like to think no dog was harmed during the filming, it’s clear that the chase is real, and the strays are running scared. Fukasaku knew that this might cause distress in some viewers who, quite rightly, might be worried for the animals’ wellbeing. By extension, this raised the question: why don’t we feel the same about the many people who live in the very same conditions and fear for their lives daily? There’s also a powerful scene in which the camera slowly pans across the young faces, and each meets our gaze with a defiant, unwavering stare. It’s a direct challenge for the audience to pass judgement on their actions, and also a pointed question: what else should they or could they do in such a dire situation?

Like its European new wave counterparts, there is a definite noir feel to the film, but this was not the initial intention. The decision to shoot in black-and-white was forced upon them by Toei Studios because the executives didn’t think the script warranted enough budget for a colour production. But in the hands of a seasoned cinematographer like Ichirō Hoshijima, shooting on a restricted budget in monochrome will inevitably end up resembling film noir. He makes good use of light and dark to structure compositions and exploits shadows to hide any shortcomings of the sets and locations. The noir atmosphere is helped along by the outstanding jazz score by experimental musician, Isao Tomita in his pre-electronica period.

Ichirō Hoshijima and Kinji Fukasaku had already collaborated on another black and white gangster film, Noon for Gangsters / 白昼の無頼漢 / Hakuchu no buraikan (1961) which also featured a group of small-time crooks and hoodlums banding together in a high-risk attempt to rob a US military cash truck, their only true bond being their mutual mistrust, greed, and avarice.

The story of Wolves, Pigs, and Men was suggested by producer Tatsu Yoshida, who pitched the idea of reworking Georges Simenon’s 1952 novel Les Frères Rico, which had already inspired a few gangster films. The story in the book followed the titular brothers as their fraternal bonds were tested by a life of crime and each forged their own distinct paths. It has been suggested that the seeds of the original novel lay in the nursery tale of The Three Little Pigs.

Writer-director Jun’ya Satō was brought in to co-write with Kinji Fukasaku, and apparently, they were both put up in a cheap inn for a month to come up with the script. The writing process was difficult as both men had their own ideas. Fukasaku has been described as indecisive at the writing stage, preferring to respond and adapt to the actors and locations during production. They both agreed on a pared-back narrative that would be contained in an almost prison-like setting, evoking a sense of claustrophobia, of being trapped—the environment becoming a metaphor of the lives of the characters—constrained, contained, and with no clear route of escape.

In case you’re wondering, the title refers to the three brothers. Jirō is the lone wolf, a wild predator that has left the pack and hunts only for himself. Kuroki is the pig, a well-fed but domesticated animal, no longer a free man but owned by his yakuza masters. This leaves Sabu to prove that he’s still a man… can he be the only brother who retains his humanity?

The themes Kinji Fukasaku explores here will recur throughout his career with similar stories of cold, soulless hardmen desperately grasping at some sort of escape or final redemption. Sympathy for the Underdog (1971) also features three men, not brothers but long-time friends, who take a stand against organisations that arrogantly assume themselves to be unassailable. He would go on to define the brutally realistic jitsuroku eiga with Battles Without Honor and Humanity (1973), which spawned the popular and influential franchise he would be remembered for. Nowadays, he’s invariably cited as the director of Battle Royale (2000), the film that ushered in the Asia Extreme genre of the 21st-century.

To end on a happy note: it was during the filming of Wolves, Pigs and Men that Kinji Fukasaku and leading actress Sanae Nakahara fell in love, and they were married the following year.

JAPAN | 1964 | 95 MINUTES | 2.35:1 | BLACK & WHITE | JAPANESE

Limited Edition Blu-ray Special Features:

• Limited Edition O-Card slipcase featuring new artwork by Grégory Sacré (Gokaiju).
• 1080p HD presentation on Blu-ray from a restoration of the original film elements supplied by Toei. This looks as good as it can with very good dynamic grading through the grey scale. Perhaps a little too good as nearly all film grain texture disappears in the shadows, but nothing distracts from the viewing pleasure and nicely showcases the cinematography.
• Original Japanese audio track (uncompressed LPCM mono).
• Audio commentary track by Jasper Sharp. Who certainly knows his stuff and shares some of his encyclopaedic knowledge of Japanese cinema. He begins by placing the movie in the context of Kinji Fukasaku’s career and goes on to compare the film with many others that are nigh on impossible to source. It’s a dense and informative commentary with the usual potted filmographies for key cast and crew, and he does take time out to provide some technical analyses of a few key scenes. However, I would have appreciated more cultural commentary on items we see in the mise en scène that would have meant something to a Japanese viewer at the time of production… and even more discussion of the film we’re watching.
• ‘Socially Aware Violence’—a 20-minute Interview with screenwriter Jun’ya Satō. He reminisces about first meeting Kinji Fukasaku and how he could communicate effectively through drawings and diagrams. He recounted how the writing process for the film was troubled but fell into a rhythm where he wrote most of the script with Fukasaku amending and approving as they progressed. They found common ground in their concerns about the class divide. They also worked hard on making the action of the narrative take place in the moral arena of interactions between the three brothers. There was also a deliberate decision to include some quite stark and realistic violence that would reflect what was occurring regularly in real life. The use of the criminal underworld as a broad metaphor of wider society is entirely deliberate.
• ‘Slums, Stars, and Studios’—a 20-minute Interview with producer Tatsu Yoshida. He gives an overview of his career from starting as a facilitator at Toei in his mid-30s when he was frustrated to be doing mundane tasks, like sorting out catering and bedding, when he wanted to produce. He remembers visionary producer Shiguru Okada joining Toei Studios and being inspired by his speeches to the company and pairing up with producer Tsune Yabe soon after. He then goes on to talk about his work with Kinji Fukasaku, with whom he made seven films, describing the director as sincere and good at inspiring passion and hard work in others. He then zooms in on the making of Wolves, Pigs and Men, discussing the production from writing, through casting, and the location shooting in the Edogawa slums as well as a few problems between actors and director when their approaches were mismatched. He remembers the shoot was no easy ride, with a studio strike threatening to halt production and the final scenes having to be made by a skeleton crew of non-union crew, before contracts expired. He also laments how the film was treated by Toei after completion when they all but abandoned it.
• 12-minute interview with Kinji Fukasaku’s biographer, Sadao Yamane. He tracks the director’s career, film-by-film, with special attention to Wolves, Pigs and Men, with plenty of behind-the-scenes information and trivia such as Ken Takakura working simultaneously on a film at the Kyoto studios and being driven between the two, playing a chivalrous character in Kyoto and a hard, amoral one in Tokyo! He then discusses the wider societal context of Japan during the time of production and how the past was bleak but, for some, the future seemed no brighter as pot-war recovery left many behind.
• Trailer.
• A collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Japanese cinema expert Joe Hickinbottom. Not available at the time of review.

Cast & Crew

director: Kinji Fukasaku.
writers: Kinji Fukasaku & Jun’ya Satō.
starring: Rentarō Mikuni, Ken Takakura, Kin’ya Kitaōji, Shinjirō Ehara, Sanae Nakahara, Renji Ishibashi, Hideo Murota, Jirō Okazaki & Hiroko Shima.