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Long before he did Battle Royale, Kinji Fukasaku was doing intense yakuza movies. So much so that he spawned numerous sequels from his first movie, Battles Without Honor and Humanity, many of which he directed. Come the end of the 1970s, he abandoned the genre and never returned to it. I didn't check out that classic, but I did watch Yakuza Graveyard, starring the main actor from Tokyo Drifter (which we watched on stream a long time ago).
The film follows Kuroiwa Ryu, a tough cop who has been moved to a new town after killing a man. In an attempt to arrest some yakuza members, he learns that his superiors are in cahoots with gang members, much to his dismay. However, he quickly lands respect with a different yakuza gang and finds himself at odds with the police.
The plot is fairly mediocre, has a xenophobia-is-bad angle to it (Koreans are people too, guys!), and the acting is not subtle most of the time (the ending was funny), but the cinematography on this one is top-notch. The cinematographer uses a handheld video camera throughout the movie (maybe save for a few scenes, but it might still have been handheld) and while it had me laughing at times picturing the guy holding the camera, it's memorable. Need to get two guys in a shot when one is on the ground? Flip that bad boy 90 degrees and get 'em all in. Apparently Fukasaka was known for this style, which means I'll have to check out some of his other yakuza movies.