Chivalry of Judo Life (1966) (Matsukata, Wakayama)

[Takuma]

I recently saw this rare movie on Toei Channel.

Chivalry of Judo Life (任侠柔一代) (Japan, 1966) [TV] - 2.5/5
Before Toei got into mass producing martial arts movies (other than samurai flicks), there was a handful of films to that mixed yakuza storylines with hand to hand fighting. This one is a ninkyo yakuza judo film. Hideo Murata is an honourable gangster who tries to assassinate rotten boss Hosei Komatsu but gets his own ass kicked. Young judo fighter Hiroki Matsukata comes to rescue. Meanwhile Komatsu gets bodyguard Tomisaburo Wakayama to look after him. Wandering karate fighter Saburo Kitajima who dislikes both Komatsu and Matsukata appears and further complicates things. Though the fights are old fashioned and a bit slow, they are quite nicely staged. Unfortunately there are too few of them. As a ninkyo film the movie is technically well done but not especially engaging. Drama lacks the kind of strong moral conflicts that you find in better ninkyo films, and it's not always clear who is supposed to be the main character. Not that bad, but not great either. The nice theme music sounds like it could be from a Zorro movie.

Matsukata

Arashi

Kitajima

Wakayama

Murata

Note: it appears the film was released theatrically in some English speaking markets. I've seen an English language trailer in Youtube, although it's now gone.

[DrNgor]

Nice review! Thanks for sharing.

I was always curious about the Sanshiro Sugata remakes that were made during the 60s and 70s. Are you familiar with them?

[whitesnake]

Wikipedia has an article on the Sugata Sanshiro movie here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanshiro_Sugata

The only info it has on the remakes is - Remakes  

Sanshiro Sugata has been remade five times since it was initially released, although these versions are even harder to find in the west than the original. The 1955 and 1965 versions share the script of the original versions, whereas the subsequent three releases are all based on the novel rather than Kurosawa's screenplay.

·                    Sugata Sanshirō (1955) - Directed by Shigeo Tanaka

·                    Sugata Sanshirō (1965) - Directed by Seiichirō Uchikawa

·                    Ninkyō Yawara Ichidai (1966) - Directed by Sadao Nakajima

·                    Sugata Sanshirō (1970) - Directed by Kunio Watanabe

·                    Sugata Sanshirō (1977) - Directed by Kihachi Okamoto

[Takuma]

1 hour ago, DrNgor said:

Nice review! Thanks for sharing.

I was always curious about the Sanshiro Sugata remakes that were made during the 60s and 70s. Are you familiar with them?

No, I haven't even seen the Kurosawa film, nor did I know Chivalry of Judo Life was based on the same novel...

Thanks for the info whitesnake!