Unification of Japan 57 (2023)

Brother

A Japanese Yakuza gangster's deadly existence in his homeland gets him exiled to Los Angeles, where he is taken in by his little brother and his brother's gang.

Dogfight: Stray Dogs' Elegy

A cocaine deal is about to go down between yakuza and Hong Kong triad gangsters and a small time porn peddler is used as a mole by a dirty cop.

The World of Kanako

When Kanako, a model daughter and a brilliant student, disappears, her mother asks her ex-husband, a violent former policeman, to find her. As his investigation progresses, his idealized image of Kanako cracks: the girl hides a dark life that her father can not even imagine.

The Last True Yakuza

A made man during the height of Hiroshima's yakuza turf war must maneuver through the violence and betrayal inside the criminal underworld.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1

An assassin is shot by her ruthless employer, Bill, and other members of their assassination circle – but she lives to plot her vengeance.

Taxi 2

A cabdriver and a cop race to Paris to rescue a love interest and the Japanese minister of defense from kidnappers.

Conflict

Tendokai's Washio Kazuma, the underboss of Japan's largest crime syndicate, goes on the warpath when his blood brother and family turn up dead.

Dead or Alive

Ryūichi and his small gang of Triad vie for control of the Japanese underworld in a crime-ridden Shinjuku quarter while Detective Jojima tries to bring it down.

Showdown in Little Tokyo

An American with a Japanese upbringing, Chris Kenner is a police officer assigned to the Little Tokyo section of Los Angeles. Kenner is partnered with Johnny Murata, a Japanese-American who isn't in touch with his roots. Despite their differences, both men excel at martial arts, and utilize their formidable skills when they go up against Yoshida, a vicious yakuza drug dealer with ties to Kenner's past.

Graveyard of Honor

A barkeeper saves a Yakuza boss' life and thus makes his way up in the organization. However, his fear of nothing soon causes problems.

The Viper Brothers and the Young General

The last in the series. Sugawara runs into two mahjong cheaters (Ichiro Araki and Mako Midori + sidekick Takuzo Kawatani) whom he takes for friends in need as his naivety prevents him from seeing their true nature.

The Viper Brothers: Prison Gang 13

Part 3 in a long running (8+1 films) action/comedy/melodrama series about a pair of short tempered, amoral, but not evil chinpira (Bunta Sugawara and Tamio Kawachi) thinking too big of themselves.

Branded to Kill

After botching his latest assignment, a third-ranked Japanese hit man becomes the target of another assassin.

Jesus is My Boss

A warring Yakuza awakens to Christianity and becomes an evangelist. The film is modelled on the real-life "Mission Barabbas," a Christian evangelistic group of ex-Yakuza.

Gozu

Minami mistakenly kills a gangster associate of his named Brother. Almost as soon as the murder takes place, the body of the deceased man is gone, prompting Minami to conduct a search. While looking, he finds a mysterious isolated hotel where he decides to take a rest. Not only are the front desk clerks a bit strange, but even the ambiance feels unusual. Minami soon realizes he may have gotten more than he bargained for.

Kanto Street Peddlers: Violent Fire Festival

The fourth film in the Kanto Street Peddlers series. The protagonist, played by Bunta Sugawara sides with female boss Yumiko Nogawa to fight evil Hiroshi Nawa, who at one point employs rebellious young hood Tsunehiko Watase and Kagawa. Tatsuo Umemiya also shows up as a cool, leather jacket gunman who gains Sugawara’s respect despite playing for the opposing team. What eventually keeps this film from being as good as the first is the loose script that doesn’t really tie all the fun stuff into a coherent package. Much is forgiven however when the last 20 minutes arrives with several visually striking set pieces (including one death scene stylized to the point of ridiculousness) and a terrific final massacre. This was Suzuki’s last contribution to the series; the fifth and final picture would be helmed by Takashi Harada.

Kanto Street Peddlers: Shallow Clan Honor

The fifth and final chapter of the Kanto Street Peddlers series! Will the battle in Asakusa be enough for a complete victory?

The Great Okinawa Yakuza War

Chiba, looking gnarly, and acting as animalistic as ever, stars alongside Matsukata as violent gangsters battling their way through fight after bloody fight with rival yakuza on the streets of Okinawa.

Sonatine

Murakawa, an aging Tokyo yakuza tiring of gangster life, is sent by his boss to Okinawa along with a few of his henchmen to help end a gang war, supposedly as mediators between two warring clans. He finds that the dispute between the clans is insignificant and whilst wondering why he was sent to Okinawa at all, his group is attacked in an ambush. The survivors flee and make a decision to lay low at the beach while they await further instructions.

Crying Freeman

A lethal assassin for a secret Chinese organisation, who sheds tears of regret each time he kills, is seen swiftly and mercilessly executing three Yakuza gangsters by a beautiful artist. She is captivated by the grace of his kill and later falls in love with him. An intense power struggle for the leadership of the Yakuza Clans ensues as they seek vengeance for the death of their leader.

History of Yakuza Conflict: Huge Organizational Split

Fujio Yamadai, the third generation leader of Japan's largest organized crime group, Tamba-gumi, has passed away due to illness. Yamatatsu group leader Tatsuo Yamanaka (Hakuryu), who has become acting group leader, recommends Tamba group leader Kazuhisa Takemoto (Hitoshi Ozawa) to Kashira. However, Sumiko, the sister of the third generation Yamadai, who actually runs the Tanba-gumi, mentions that Takemoto is the man who will inherit the fourth generation of the Tanba-gumi. Eventually, the Takemoto faction and Yamanakaha became enemies, and the huge organization split into two. This spurs the assassination of the boss...

The Outer Way

The cop Himuro is picked as scapegoat by his superiors because of their own involvement in sokaiya gangster practices.

Shinjuku Swan

Shiratori Tatsuhiko works as a scout for Burst, a talent agency in Kabukichō, Shinjuku's red light district. In a business where money means everything Tatsuhiko finds himself in a constant struggle between rival talent scouts and the yakuza.

Conflict III

Washio now reigns as boss of Tendokai, but a deal over casino operating rights ignites a fierce war with a hostile faction in the Kansai region.

First Love

One night in Tokyo, Leo, a young boxer, meets his first love, Monica, an imprisoned sex worker. Caught up in a drug-smuggling scheme, they find themselves pursued by a corrupt cop, a yakuza, his nemesis, and a female assassin.

Gray Wall Gear

The stage of this work is Saitama, a suburb of Tokyo in the early Heisei period. Immediately after the bubble burst gangster countermeasures law, there were gangsters who defended the last territory and young people who freely controlled the city. The youth conflict escalated day by day and became a force that surpassed the yakuza, and the runaways were sent to juvenile prisons one after another, where exclusive rules awaited.

Unification of Japan Gaiden: Nakajima Family - Shikoku Gold Mine Mayhem

Nakajima invested all his money in stocks. However, these shares turned out to be worthless. Nakajima, who urgently needs 200,000 in a week, is determined to return it, but...

Unification of Japan Gaiden: Tamura Yuto

A side story from the popular knight series Unification of Japan, centered on Yuto Tamura, played by Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi. The situation becomes more complicated when a politician intervenes in a fight between Tamura and Marukami-kai.

Unification of Japan Gaiden: Tamura Yuto 2

The second part of a two-part extravaganza featuring Yuto Tamura, who is played by Yamaguchi Yoshiyuki, one of the central characters of the Unification of Japan series, as the sole protagonist. What awaits Tamura and the lonely girl Yui, and how will everything turn out?

Kids Return

Shinji and Masaru spend most of their school days harassing fellow classmates and playing pranks. They drop out and Shinji becomes a small-time boxer, while Masaru joins up with a local yakuza gang. However, the world is a tough place.

The Yakuza

When George Tanner does business with high-ranking Yakuza Tono, Tono kidnaps his daughter, and George summons his old friend, private eye Harry Kilmer, to Japan to investigate.

The Viper Brothers: Up on 30 Charges

Part 7 in a long running (8+1 films) action/comedy/melodrama series about a pair of short tempered, amoral, but not evil chinpira (Bunta Sugawara and Tamio Kawachi) thinking too big of themselves. Katsuji finds his long lost mother, who is a rich lady of a respectable family. Comedy and melodrama ensue. A thrilling spectacle with an overly violent ending, and a remarkable, Japan's only post-prison rape comedy, Masa is determined to have sex with the female guard, despite the fact that there is a bar between them. Michi Azuma (topless swordswoman from Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril) plays a tomboy who wants to join her brothers.

Like a Dragon: Prologue

In 1970s-era Japan, three children, Kazuma Kiryu, Akira Nishikiyama, and his younger sister, Yuko Nishikiyama, are raised together in Shintaro Kazama's Sunflower Orphanage. In the summer of 1980, Yumi Sawamura, a young girl whose parents were accidentally shot and killed during a gang's shootout, joins them in the orphanage. Following a yakuza tradition, the honorable Kazama secretly raises orphans whose parents he has directly or indirectly killed. In return, the children love him as a father and he eventually inducts the teenage Kiryu and Nishikiyama into the Dojima Family, a Tojo Clan affiliate of which he is a senior officer.

Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl

In dreamlike mountain scenery, Toshiko makes a daring escape from her sexually warped Uncle Sonezaki. Fortunately, she met Samehada as she runs for her life, which is also escaping from some slayers. What follows is a wild chase that leads the audience into a comically violent world.

Rainy Dog

A Japanese assassin stranded in Taiwan must take work from a local crime boss to make ends meet when suddenly a woman from his past delivers a son to him.

Monday

A simple funeral turns a man's world Topsy turvy. He wakes up in a posh hotel room, totally clueless about how he got there. Slowly, he recalls what happened a day before.

Shinjuku Triad Society

Tatsuhito, a cop, pursues Chinese warlord Wang through the underworld of Shinjuku and over to Taiwan.

Fudoh: The New Generation

In order to settle a business dispute, a mob leader murders one of his own teenage sons. The surviving son vows to avenge his brother's death, and organizes his own gang of teenage killers to destroy his father's organization.

Postman Blues

Sawaki is a postman who's not quite thrilled about his boring way of life. But his life is about to change when he delivers mail to his old schoolmate Noguchi, who's now a member of the Yakuza, the Japanese Mafia, and just finished cutting his little finger off.

Outrage Coda

Five years after the all-out war between the Sanno and Hanabishi crime families, former yakuza boss Otomo works in South Korea for Mr. Chang, a noted fixer. When tensions rise between Chang and the Hanabishi, and Chang's life is endangered, Otomo returns to Japan to settle things once and for all.

Gang vs. Gang

The plot opens with the hero (Tsuruta) leaving prison, having served time through taking the blame for a fellow gang member’s crime. However, his former gang boss seems to have gone to seed, with people now killing each other and dealing in drugs. The hero then teams up with a lone operator (Tamba) who specialises in shaking down gangsters.

Battles Without Honor and Humanity

In the teeming black markets of postwar Japan, Shozo Hirono and his buddies find themselves in a new war between factious and ambitious yakuza.

Exiled to Hell

It is the end of the Taisho era (1912-1926), and at the Hanazuki-tei theatre in Asakusa, the famous performance of storyteller Koiso Kikuji and performer Kataoka Koshin is reaching its climax when the Tawaraya family interferes... This is an entertaining action film bursting with righteousness and humanity, centred on men who try to live righteously against a corrupt boss who preys on the performers.

Gambling Den Desire

In a small town on the Kasumigaura coast in the early Showa period, the Masukawa clan from Tokyo is trying to take away the interests of the local Isetoku family. Setsuko, the adopted daughter of the Isetoku family, falls in love with Seijiro, a travelling raven she meets on a whim. However, Koide, a businessman connected to the Masukawa clan, wants Setsuko to become his mistress... Setsuko puts aside her love and her regrets and bets on the greatest female challenge of her life!

Pornostar

A young man decides one day to start killing yakuza. After he kills his first two he gets roped into helping a wannabe gangster and his bumbling underlings to perform a hit. While things work out in the beginning, this young psychopath quickly becomes more trouble than the gang expected. Will they be able to rid themselves of him, or will they be his next victims?

The Pledge

When Omuro Yahachi of the Omuro family is selected as Mutsumikai Soke's successor, the conflict between the Kitakyushu and Wakamatsu begins.

The Rule for a Vagabond

A brave warrior fights to restore peace to a town riddled by crime, one sword at a time, in this historical action saga.

Pigs and Battleships

In the city of Yokosuka, Kinta and his lover Haruko, both involved with yakuza, brave the post-occupation period with a goal to be together.

Adrenaline Drive

A gas leak explosion at a yakuza hideout provides a shy nurse and a rental car clerk with the opportunity to take a briefcase full of money. A cross-country chase ensues.

Yakuza: Like a Dragon

Former yakuza underling Kazuma Kiryū has recently been released from prison after a lengthy incarceration and is trying to piece his life together and distance himself from his yakuza past. Unfortunately, Kiryū's problems slowly escalate as he is pursued by a former associate, the baseball-bat-wielding psycho Gorō Majima, who has a grudge to settle with Kiryū.

Kill or Be Killed

When Yakuza decides to take avenge his brother, the war shall begin.

Music Box

A former yakuza returns to gangster life after an old enemy threatens his son.

American Yakuza

When Nick Davis leaves prison after one year in solitairy, he is hired to operate a forklift in a warehouse in the harbor owned by the Japanese Yakuza patriarch Isshin Tendo. The place is assaulted by the Italian Mafia lead by Dino Campanela and Nick rescues and saves the life of Shuji Sawamoto, who is the representative of Yakuza interests in America. Shuji hires Nick to work for Yakuza and becomes his godfather in the family after his oath to join Yakuza. However, Nick is a lonely FBI undercover agent assigned to penetrate the criminal organization. When the FBI discovers that Campanela is organizing a massive attack to destroy the Yakuza, Nick's boss Littman calls off the operation to leave the dirty work to the Italian Mafia. But the connection of Nick with Shuji and his goddaughter Yuko forces him to help his Japanese family.