<h1>Text/ Movie Watcher</h1>
(This article was originally published in today's headlines)
What do you think of a Japanese gangster?
It is a tattooed body, a cigarette in the mouth, a machete waist in other social cruelty; it is a local bully who has a card face when he goes out, does not spare any effort, and everyone is frightened. They are neatly dressed, the gang rules are strict, and ordinary people can be afraid for several days at a glance...
stop! Please stop imagining.
Is this really the case with Japanese gangsters in real life?
Latest News: Near a station on the JR Yamanote Line in Tokyo, there is a bubble tea shop run by gang members. Gang members said, "There's no better deal than this." Kazuo Taoka, the third generation leader of the Yamaguchi Group, was very pleased and often reminded his subordinates to do more serious things.
What！？ Gangsters sell milk tea? Don't laugh, it's not over yet.
A search on the Internet, the current Japanese gangsters in order to survive, began to sell memes, and some even went to change sex as girl idols. It sounds a little incredible, but in fact, when you think about it, it's not so strange.
Many people's impressions of Japanese gangsters almost all come from Japanese gangster movies, but if you look back at the development of Japanese gangster movies from the 60s to the present, you will find that in the dark, all this seems to be arranged, including gangsters buying milk tea.
<h1>01, Renxia gangster movie</h1>
Gangsters and gangster movies are also available in other countries, why is It that Japan has the most attention?
Without him, because it is important enough, and the environment is so.
Japan is one of the few countries in the world where gangsters have been legalized, and gangster movies, as the export carrier of Japanese national culture, always echo with the real society outside the image, fickle and ambiguous, as if it is a social archive.
Extremely Evil 3 (2017)
As early as the "studio era" of the 1930s, Japanese films began to imitate American gangster movies. On the basis of local samurai films, some gangster elements are added, but the core of its narrative is still the traditional Bushido spirit, that is, human morality, such as Ozu Yasujiro's "The Wife of the Night" (1930) and Akira Kurosawa's "Muddy Angel" (1948).
Drunken Angel (1948)
Although it is a theft from others, it has sown the seeds of Japanese gangster movies. In the 1960s, it gradually took root under the soil of Japan's social environment.
At that time, during the post-war period, the economy and ideological trends were in a period of fluctuation, and a large number of groups and organizations appeared in Japanese society to extort money in the name of protection. By 1963, the gang was formed, and seven large gangs were gathered in society, and the tentacles spread to all walks of life.
Such social realities profoundly influence filmmaking.
So in the 1960s, led by Toei Studios, Japanese gangster movies exploded and quickly became popular culture at the time. This batch of gangster movies was later collectively known as "Renxia Gangster Movies", also known as "Renxia Pictures".
The first true "Renxia Gangster Movie" was born in 1964, produced by Toei and directed by Shigehiro Ozawa. The film received a huge response after its release, and it also strengthened the other studios to embark on the road to gangster movies.
Ozawa Shigehiro, The Goutsu (1964)
Until the early 1970s, "Renxia gangster movies" were an indispensable part of mainstream culture, and most of them were mainly "series movies", which were often seven or eight consecutive films, through an almost "brainwashing" image and style repetition, making it completely detached from samurai movies, and it was also a solid foundation for gangster movies.
For example, Ishii's "Flowers, Storms, Violent Regiments" produced 11 sequels between 1961 and 1967, detailing the gang life of gangsters; "The Legend of the Japanese Hero" also made 11 films; "Showa Remnant" filmed 9 films; "Red Peony Gambler" filmed 8 films.
Flowers, Storms, Violent Regiments (1961)
In addition to quantity, there is also quality. Yamashita's Red Peony Gambler (1968) and Uchida's Theater of Life: Speeding Car Corner and Kira Tsuki (1968) are considered classic gangster films of this period.
Theater of Life: Speeding Car Corner and Kira Tsuneyoshi (1968)
The market for gangster movies is good, and Nichizo, Shochiku, Toho, and Daiei have also entered the market, and Japanese gangster movies have reached their peak in their infancy. The reason why the market can tolerate so many gangster movies is naturally inseparable from the mood of the people.
At that time, real-life gangsters committed evil, and almost half of the criminal cases throughout the year were brawls, robberies, and murders provoked by major gangs.
For the people at the bottom, gangster movies satisfy their projection of personal heroism and bring them long-term excitement, especially in series.
<h1>02. Record gangster movies</h1>
However, too much force often brings side effects, and the stimulation brought by this almost assembly line production filming model to the market and the public has been exhausted by the 70s. As creativity dried up and audience tastes became increasingly picky, gangster movies were forced to seek transformation.
As a result, the "Renxia Gangster Movie" withdrew from the historical stage and replaced it with a "recorded gangster movie" on the stage. The latter abandons the character settings of good and evil and dual opposition in the "Renxia Gangster Movie", and focuses on the cruel reality of gangster life, striving for realism, using the lens to restore those violent scenes, and doing its best to be cruel and straightforward.
In 1973, "The Battle of No Mercy", adapted from a true story and directed by Shinji Fukasaku, established the transformation of Japanese gangster films.
The Battle without Mercy (1973)
Fukasaku Shinji sword to the side, with a cold, documentary, close to the news of the image style, erased the hypocrisy and whitewash of the gangsters in the "Renxia Gangster Movie", and presented the gang's firefight and infighting on the screen. The three words "no benevolence" also show his cognition and attitude towards Japanese gangsters.
But in fact, the success of "Battle without Mercy" did not drive the popularity of the genre of "recorded gangster movies" in the market, far from reaching the grand situation of "Renxia gangster movies" in the 60s.
Until the end of the 80s, it was difficult for gangster movies to regain the former glory of "Renxia gangster movies", and even disappeared, and there were very few of them.
It was a period of ups and downs, and the economic take-off of the 70s brought a wide variety of VCD DVDs and a variety of new and fashionable entertainment venues, which affected the public's viewing interest. The pressure to survive and economy is not so great, and people's emotions are no longer pinned on gangster movies.
Japan in the 1980s
By the end of the 1980s, Japan's bubble economy began to burst and entered a long period of economic depression. During this period, the emergence of gangster movies also seemed very out of place, and the appearance of Japanese movies was nothing more than the extremes of extreme beauty and extreme evil. As in the post-war period of the 1960s, new stimuli were desperately sought and needed.
<h1>03, extreme gangster movie</h1>
In the 1990s, the saviors of Japanese gangster movies appeared, and they also announced that this genre film officially entered the "Era of Extreme Path", they were Takashi Miike and Takeshi Kitano.
Takashi Miike (left) and Takeshi Kitano (right)
It can be said that without the emergence of these two directors, Japanese gangster movies would probably have stopped forever in the 70s, and it is impossible to have such an influence as it is today.
Takashi Miike and Takeshi Kitano's gangster films have historical significance, inheriting traditions and technological innovations, completing the artistic transformation of Japanese gangster films, and attracting international attention.
Takashi Miike makes Japanese gangster movies into "borderless films", in which the characters are arranged in a borderless, cross-genre overhead time and space, and the film amplifies the characters' wandering, hopeless floating state, nakedly showing the aesthetics of violence.
In the masterpiece "Killer Ah Yi" (2001), it is full of jaw-dropping, disgusting and disgusting shots, challenging the audience's endurance limits again and again. But behind the violence, there is still a reflection on human nature, hiding the cultural connotation of despair and contradiction. It tells how the psychological state of the degenerate marginal people in the extremely harsh environment collapsed step by step.
Killer A Yi (2001)
Takeshi Kitano's gangster films are groundbreaking, he completely avoids the righteous human feelings of "Renxia gangster movies" and the documentary color of "real-recorded gangster movies", and uses an extremely private author image to make a "extreme gangster movie".
Fast editing, minimalist dialogue, expressions, and constantly interspersed empty mirrors contrast with violent and direct violence, joy, and emotional outbursts, thus bringing about audiovisual and sensory shock.
From Sonata (1993), Hanabi (1997), Gangster (2000), Doll (2002) to Extremely Evil (2010), this video style has been consistent. The origin of all the conflicts in the film is the violence of gangsters, and Takeshi Kitano shows a kind of violence that has been processed and beautified, taking the so-called "aesthetics of violence" to a new level.
Sonata (1993)
Hanabi (1997)
The most representative is 2000's "Gangster", in addition to the typical Japanese gangsters' finger chopping, abdomen cutting and other behaviors, there are also crazy actions such as inserting chopsticks into the nostrils and machine gun strafing.
In "Extremely Evil", kimura's cutting off his fingers with an art knife is also shocking, and the broken fingers, as a way of atonement for the sins of the gangs, appeared many times in Takeshi Kitano's "Extreme Gangster Movie".
The Big Guy (2000)
The Most Evil (2010)
Takashi Miike and Takeshi Kitano's greatest contribution is to make gangster movies, a genre film in Japanese history, into a cultural symbol, full of universality and modernity, and exported as representatives of Asian films, influencing a number of American directors such as Quentin, Eastwood, and Jarmusch, and greatly enhancing the international status of Japanese gangster films.
Jarmusch", "Ghost Dog Killer"
Quentin,"Kill Bill"
<h1>04, entertain to death</h1>
After entering the new century, with the audience's acceptance of postmodern culture, the spirit of entertainment and the spirit of play began to invade Japanese gangster movies, and gangster movies had to transform again.
More and more gangster movies began to use comics as the prototype, integrating elements of other genre films, and the sentimental and depressing black atmosphere became rare, full of new styles of spoofing, hilarity, deconstruction, and fragmentation, as if adapting to this era of entertainment to death, there was a contrasting joy.
Examples include Toya Sato's My Boss, My Hero (2006), Takashi Miike's Hot Blood High School (2007) and Song of the Mole (2013), Nobuo Mizuta's Master apology (2013), and Takeshi Kitano's Ryuzo and His Party of Seven (2015).
Hot Blood College (2007)
Dragon Three and His Party of Seven (2015)
In terms of narrative, these gangster movies are also problematic, there are a lot of irrationality and disharmony, but the audience is happy to find treasure in the absurd world constructed by the movie. Depth and seriousness are gently dissolved, and sensual images replace rational discourse, which can be summed up simply: watch gangster movies, just for tu yi le.
In such a postmodern context full of nonsense and carnival, the image style of Japanese gangster movies has been completely subverted, and movies have been reduced to an entertainment tool because of their rejection of historical consciousness and practical significance.
Hot Blood College 2 (2009)
So, now that we see news like Japanese gang members selling milk tea, do we still think it's too strange? This is a kind of gamer attitude, as if it is the bridge that today's Japanese gangster movies will have. It looks so funny, but it's real.
Japanese gangster movies do not do the runners of the times, nor do they do the prophets, it is a mirror that moves with the times, has a lasting and exuberant vitality, and it and reality are mutually superficial and complementary. The aesthetics of violence and entertainment to the death cater to the aesthetics of contemporary audiences, which is what this era needs
So, the reality is the creative library of Japanese gangster movies, and selling milk tea is just one of the small ideas, which is not surprising.
(End)