The Cinematheque

35mm Print

“If you see only one Suzuki, this should be it—a whacked-out yakuza thriller.”

Tom Charity, The Rough Guide to Film

Tasked with making a vehicle for actor-singer Watari Tetsuya to croon the title song, Suzuki concocted this yarn about a reformed yakuza on the run from his former comrades. The film is mainly an excuse to stage an escalating series of playful musical numbers and over-the-top fight scenes. Popping with garish colours, self-parodic style, and avant-garde visual design, Tokyo Drifter embodies a late-1960s zeitgeist in which trash and art joyfully commingle. ​“With influences that range from Pop Art to 1950s Hollywood musicals, and from farce and absurdist comedy to surrealism, Suzuki shows off his formal acrobatics in a film that is clearly meant to mock rather than celebrate the yakuza film genre” (Nikolaos Vryzidis, Directory of World Cinema: Japan). —Tom Vick

In Japanese with English subtitles

This opening-night screening of Tokyo Drifter will include a video introduction by William Carroll.

“Inspired lunacy … Somehow, it still just about works as a thriller.”

Geoff Andrew, Time Out 

“One of the most brilliant genre movies ever made.”

Tony Rayns, Sight and Sound