Backdrop image for movie Two Lives, Two Yakuza

Two Lives, Two Yakuza (1964)

An early ninkyo film from before the genre had truly established its form. Koji Tsuruta plays an honourable outlaw who saves an older man from an ambush. It turns out the man is the head of a hard working clan appointed to a railway construction project. A ruthless yakuza gang is also trying to get their share of the project and attempts to sabotage the work. After the old man dies, his son (Sonny Chiba) and daughter (Junko Fuji) try to complete the project. Tsuruta joins them while also falling in love with a local woman working in a bar (after all, Tsuruta always was more of a lover than his stoic colleague Takakura).

Crime
Drama

Top billed cast

Koji TsurutaShinjiro Kusakari
Sumiko FujiYukiko Matsuhashi
Shigeru AmachiSeiji Nawate
Takeshi KatōMakoto Misugi
Eijirō YanagiGenichiro Matsuhashi
Sonny ChibaShinichi Matsuhashi
Yoshiko SakumaKumi Kitajima
Kenji Ushio
Fumitake Ōmura
Akikane Sawa

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