is a

1967 Events January * January 1 – Canada begins a year-long celebration of the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, Confederation, featuring the Expo 67 World's Fair. * January 6 – Vietnam War: United States Marine Corps and Army of ...

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

yakuza film is a popular film genre in Japanese cinema which focuses on the lives and dealings of ''yakuza'', Japanese organized crime syndicates. In the silent film era, depictions of '' bakuto'' (precursors to modern yakuza) as sympathetic Robin Hood- ...

directed by

Takashi Nomura Takashi Nomura (野村孝) (February 18, 1927 – May 5, 2015) was a Japanese film director for studios including Nikkatsu. The Criterion Collection described him as a "prominent, stylistically daring director". In 1955, he joined Nikkatsu Film ...

for the

Nikkatsu Corporation is a Japanese film studio located in Bunkyō. The name ''Nikkatsu'' amalgamates the words Nippon Katsudō Shashin, literally "Japan Motion Pictures". Shareholders are Nippon Television Holdings (35%) and SKY Perfect JSAT Corporation (28.4%). ...

. It is based on the novel '' Tobosha'' by Shinji Fujihara. It stars

Joe Shishido was a Japanese actor recognizable for his intense, eccentric yakuza film roles. He appeared in some 300 films but is best known in the West for his performance in the cult film ''Branded to Kill'' (1967). In Japan, he is also known by the nickna ...

as a

hitman Contract killing (also known as murder-for-hire) is a form of murder or assassination in which one party hires another party to kill a targeted person or people. It involves an illegal agreement which includes some form of compensation, moneta ...

and Jerry Fujio as his partner; reprising his usual roles of contract killer, Shishido's performance in the film launched him beyond doubt as a

hard boiled ''Hard Boiled'' ()Elder, 2005, pg. xxviii is a 1992 Hong Kong action thriller film directed by John Woo from a screenplay by Gordon Chan and Barry Wong based on a story written by Woo. The film stars Chow Yun-fat, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, an ...

action hero, not only in Japan but in the whole genre, and remained his personal favourite of the most of 100 films he made at Nikkatsu. The film was strongly influenced by

French New Wave The New Wave (, ), also called the French New Wave, is a French European art cinema, art film movement that emerged in the late 1950s. The movement was characterized by its rejection of traditional filmmaking conventions in favor of experimentat ...

and

crime film Crime film is a film belonging to the crime fiction genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and fiction. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as Drama (film and television), dr ...

s directors such as

Jean-Pierre Melville Jean-Pierre Grumbach (20 October 1917 – 2 August 1973), known professionally as Jean-Pierre Melville (), was a French filmmaker. Considered a spiritual godfather of the French New Wave, he was one of the first fully-independent French filmmake ...

Jacques Becker Jacques Becker (; 15 September 1906 – 21 February 1960) was a French film director and screenwriter. His films, made during the 1940s and 1950s, encompassed a wide variety of genres, and they were admired by some of the filmmakers who led th ...

Henri Decoin Henri Decoin (18 March 1890 – 4 July 1969) was a French film director and screenwriter, who directed more than 50 films between 1933 and 1964. He was also a swimmer who won the national title in 1911 and held the national record in the 500 ...

and by

Sergio Leone Sergio Leone ( ; ; 3 January 1929 – 30 April 1989) was an Italian filmmaker, credited as the pioneer of the spaghetti Western genre. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest directors in the history of cinema. Leone's film-making style ...

-style

westerns The Western is a genre of fiction typically set in the American frontier (commonly referred to as the "Old West" or the "Wild West") between the California Gold Rush of 1849 and the closing of the frontier in 1890, and commonly associated wit ...

. Nomura's use of still shots in the opening sequence has been compared to manga art techniques. This film was made available in North America when Janus Films released a special set of Nikkatsu Noir films as part of

the Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home video, home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films". A "sister company" of art film, arth ...

, also including '' I Am Waiting'', '' Rusty Knife'', '' Take Aim at the Police Van'', and '' Cruel Gun Story''.

Plot

Contract killer Contract killing (also known as murder-for-hire) is a form of murder or assassination in which one party hires another party to kill a targeted person or people. It involves an illegal agreement which includes some form of compensation, moneta ...

Shuji Kamimura (

) and his partner Shun Shiozaki ( Jerry Fujio) are hired by yakuza boss Senzaki to eliminate a former partner, Boss Shimazu, who has embezzled from an international co-op between both men. Kamimura successfully assassinates Boss Shimazu at his home while meeting with Senzaki. Kamimura and Shun attempt to leave the country by plane, but are waylaid and kidnapped by Shimazu's men. The duo escapes by stopping their car with a specially designed second brake behind the driver's seat that Shun had installed earlier, which kills Shimazu's men. Senzaki's lieutenant Nozaki orders them to hide out at a truck stop, the Hotel Nagisakan, to wait for further instructions. Whilst staying there, the duo form a connection with the hotel's overworked waitress, Mina. Later that night, more gunmen under Shimazu's lieutenant, following information from fellow yakuza boss Tsugawa arrive to kill them, but do not find the duo as they have escaped by bribing one of the patrons to take them to another motel. The next day, Miyoshi, Shimazu's enforcer, attempts to kill the duo by intercepting them and ordering their ferry which was supposed to be their getaway vehicle to depart early. Kamimura and Shun show up in the truck they rode in from the previous night and run over the hitman, but the ferry has already left. Returning to the Nagisakan, Kamimura drugs Shun with a sleeping pill while Mina directs him to a freighter captain willing to smuggle the three out of the country. However, Tsugawa manages to broker a peace deal between Senzaki and Shimazu's son, who has succeeded his father as boss. The two settle their differences and decide to have Kamimura eliminated. Shun is later kidnapped at the Nagisakan, and when Mina arrives to pick him up and her belongings, is told by Senzaki by phone to have Kamimura meet with one of his henchmen. Later, Mina returns to Kamimura and tries to leave without Shun, but one of Senzaki's men arrives. Kamimura then negotiates to have Shun released in exchange for himself in three hours. The exchange goes as planned, and the ship leaves without Kamimura, who arranges to meet with Senzaki and Shimazu at a landfill the next morning for his execution. Kamimura then spends the rest of the day planning on how to fight off the gunmen, spying on them testing a special car with bulletproof windows, which Senzaki, Shimazu, and Tsugawa plan to use to safely watch Kamimura's execution. In order to destroy the car, Kamimura then builds a bomb and digs a ditch to hide in so he can safely plant the bomb on the car. Shortly after finishing the ditch, he is beset by hitmen and fends them off. The car carrying Senzaki, Shimazu, and Tsugawa then moves to run him over with Miyoshi in the front trying to shoot Kamimura. Kamimura is hit several times but when the car is almost upon him, he dives into the ditch and plants the bomb under the car. The car explodes, killing all its occupants. An injured Kamimura then briefly surveys the carnage before limping away, ending the film.

Cast

as Shuji Kamimura * Jerry Fujio as Shun Shiozaki * Chitose Kobayashi as Mina * Shoki Fukae as Funaki * Hideaki Esumi as Senzaki * Jun Hongo as Kaneko * Akio Miyabe as Miyoshi * Toyoko Takechi as Otatsu * Zenji Yamada as barge captain * Kanjuro Arashi as Shimazu *

Ryōtarō Sugi (born 14 August 1944, Kobe) is a Japanese singer and actor. He is the father of actor Jundai Yamada. He appeared in ''Sukima Kaze'', which sold over a million copies. His acting credits include 18 films. On television, he specialized in ''jid ...

as Shimazu's successor * Kojiro Kusanagi as hitman * Takamaru Sasaki as Otawara * Asao Uchida as Tsugawa * Zeko Nakamura as apartment receptionist

References

External links

* *
A Colt Is My Passport
' at the

Japanese Movie Database The , more commonly known as simply JMDb, is an online database of information about Japanese movies, actors, and production crew personnel. It is similar to the Internet Movie Database but lists only those films initially released in Japan. Y. ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Colt Is My Passport 1967 films Japanese black-and-white films 1960s crime thriller films 1960s Japanese-language films Japanese neo-noir films Nikkatsu films Yakuza films 1960s Japanese films