Battles Without Honor and Humanity

1973 1h 39m JA

👍

7.3

SOLID

★7.3TMDB · 127

CrimeActionDrama

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

In the teeming black markets of postwar Japan, Shozo Hirono and his buddies find themselves in a new war between factious and ambitious yakuza.

“Some stories are better left unspoiled.”

WhatsApp X Facebook Telegram

Where to watch · US

Cast

Bunta Sugawara
Shozo Hirono
Hiroki Matsukata
Tetsuya Sakai
Kunie Tanaka
Masakichi Makihara
Eiko Nakamura
Suzue Kunihiro
Tsunehiko Watase
Toshio Arita
Gorō Ibuki
Ueda
Nobuo Kaneko
Yoshio Yamamori
Toshie Kimura
Mrs. Yamamori

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Kinji Fukasaku
Writers: Kazuo Kasahara, Koichi Iiboshi
Languages: Japanese
Countries: Japan

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Shot for just $0.1M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

ERA

Did you know

53 years old — a genuine piece of film history.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

CINEMA

Did you know

Part of the "The Yakuza Papers Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Kinji Fukasaku, shot by Sadaji Yoshida. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Toshiaki Tsushima. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Shintarō Miyamoto shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Bunta Sugawara and Hiroki Matsukata and Kunie Tanaka carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0070246 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Kinji Fukasaku directs. Sadaji Yoshida behind the camera. Toshiaki Tsushima scores. Shintarō Miyamoto cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. Produced in Japan. Dialogue in Japanese.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Shot for just $0.1M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.
253 years old — a genuine piece of film history.
3Part of the "The Yakuza Papers Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
4Directed by Kinji Fukasaku, shot by Sadaji Yoshida. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
5Original score by Toshiaki Tsushima. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
6Editor Shintarō Miyamoto shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
7Bunta Sugawara and Hiroki Matsukata and Kunie Tanaka carry the top of the cast.
8IMDB entry: tt0070246 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
9Classified under 11 themes, including "yakuza", "hiroshima, japan", "betrayal", "criminal underworld".
10Released under 13 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Cinematography: Sadaji Yoshida
Original score: Toshiaki Tsushima
Editing: Shintarō Miyamoto
Production design: Takatoshi Suzuki
Runtime: 99 min · 1h 39m
Status: Released
Budget: $150,000
Original language: JA
IMDB: Battles Without Honor and Humanity (1973)

Part of

The Yakuza Papers Collection

While The Godfather romanticized the American Mafia in the early 1970s, Kinji Fukasaku's five-film series known as The Yakuza Papers: Battles Without Honor & Humanity revolutionized the Japanese yakuza film with unprecedented intensity. A post-World War II epic that broke Japanese box-office records, this complex, utterly authentic cycle of gangster films replaced the popular ninkyo or "chivalry" films of the '60s with jitsuroku, an entirely new breed of gangster film that rose from the ashes of Hiroshima and post-war reconstruction, depicting a meticulously detailed "alternate history" that had been ignored by the "official" factual record.