• ある脅迫 (Intimidation), 9/6/22 (Tues)

Kurahara Koreyoshi’s accomplished 1960 flick (the Japanese title is “A Certain Blackmail”) is sometimes referred to as the first Japanese noir, and while I doubt that’s true, it does seem to be the first to have made a real impression. Kurahara is best known for the Takakura Ken vehicle Antartica (南極物語), which reigned for years as Japan’s highest-grossing domestic film (and remains second for non-anime works). This film, worlds away from that epic, is a tightly wound suspense piece that manages to lay out a carefully plotted story and nicely delineated characters in just over an hour. Talk about efficiency. It’s based on a story by Takigawa Kyo, who gave his villain the similar name Takita Kyosuke.

The movie centers on the relationship between Takita (Kaneko Nobuo), a fast-rising bank executive, and his childhood friend Nakaike Matakichi (Nishimura Ko), a meek low-level clerk in the same bank. Takita is being promoted, an event being celebrated at a big gathering. Takita’s self-satisfied attitude versus Nakaike’s obsequiousness makes clear the different paths that they have taken. We come to understand, however, that much of Takita’s success lies in his marriage to the chairman’s daughter – who, as it happens, was once Nakaike’s girlfriend. We learn that he’s also sleeping with Nakaike’s sister. Nakaike, who never made it beyond middle school, is not unmindful of Takita’s ruthless pursuit of success but appears timidly to accept it as the way of the world. Nakaike’s own sister had been dating Takita and is furious with her brother for allowing his rich girlfriend to be stolen away and thus replacing her in the bargain. She pushes her brother to be more assertive, but he seems a lost cause.

Trouble comes when another man who had been cuckolded by Takita approaches him with proof of the banker’s embezzlement of bank funds, threatening to go to the police if Takita does not pay a huge sum in two days time. (One odd translation: He tells Takita that no one would suspect a bank manager of robbing from his own bank, using the Japanese idiom todai moto kurashi (it’s darkest at the foot of the lighthouse), i.e., right under their nose. It’s rendered in the subtitle as “No lighthouse can shine on itself”, which is rather obscure.)

Takita, seeing his entire future at risk, becomes desperate. Learning that Nakaike will be night watchman that evening, he gets his old friend drunk to clear the way, then carries out a clumsy robbery of his own bank in order to secure the money. When that plot goes awry, he manages to throw the blame onto Nakaike in a heartless act of humiliation. An encounter with the blackmailer also results in the latter’s death before Takita’s very eyes, thus removing the threat completely. Or so he thinks. Events take a different turn when Nakaike reports to Takita that the dead man has shown up in his office. Nakaike briefly gains the upper hand, but the twists keep coming until the final moments, when the rug is pulled out from under both the main characters.

The story is taut, and the characterizations extremely well drawn for such a brief film. The way the director builds the tension in Takita’s long, sweaty, nearly wordless robbery scene is especially memorable, but his work throughout is first rate. Kaneko and Nishimura, familiar faces usually found in supporting roles, do stellar work, with able support especially from Shiraki Mari as the sister.