meta: Yakuza
2021
'Sailor Suit And Machine Gun: Graduation': Shots In The Dark August 27, 2021
A functionally competent follow-up to the cult classic, but when your ancestor is a cult classic, you want more than just functional follow-up
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'Sailor Suit And Machine Gun': She Shoots To Conquer August 23, 2021
This off-kilter 1981 comedy about a girl inheriting a crew of not-very-competent yakuza is an oddball masterwork that zags when you think it'll zig
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2019
'Ryuko': International Woman Of Mystery November 18, 2019
A gorgeous homage to everything from Meiko Kaji's femme-violence films to 'Black Lagoon', but it's too top-heavy with plot and not resourceful enough about its own best ideas
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Bonten Taro's 'Badass Babe! Sex & Fury & Other Stories': The Girl With The Hanafuda Tattoo April 20, 2019
An eclectic collection of manga work from a tattoo artist, folk singer, and quasi-underworld figure until now only marginally known in the West
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2018
Natsuo Kirino's 'Out': The Katori Corpse Disposal Service November 14, 2018
Natsuo Kirino's nervy thriller pits four working-class women against Japanese society -- not just its seedy underbelly, but its whole stacked deck of capital, class, and sex
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'Ichi The Killer': The (Sado)Masochism Tango March 23, 2018
Nearly twenty years later, this remains Takashi Miike's most notorious film, but notoriety is about all it has left going for it
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2017
'Wolf Guy': Bark At The Moon May 30, 2017
A truly strange specimen from Sonny Chiba's filmography, and an illuminating early example of how manga adaptations were a perfect fit for 1970s exploitation cinema from Japan
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