Obscure Japanese Film #54
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| Jiro Tamiya |
This Daiei thriller stars Jiro Tamiya as Segawa, a bankrupt stockbroker now reduced to working as a salesman. He has a huge debt to pay off, but unfortunately he’s been unable to sell a single one of the ‘electric massagers’ he’s supposed to be flogging, so he decides to ask his boss, Sawai (Yusuke Takita), if he can try selling something else instead. Sawai confesses that the massagers are just a front for an industrial espionage agency he’s running, then offers Segawa some well-paid work spying on a pharmaceutical company run by Ogino (Akira Natsuki), also confessing that this was the real reason he had recruited Segawa in the first place and that he has been waiting for the right moment to tell him. Sawai knows that Segawa used to be engaged to Ogino’s wife, Eiko (Kaoru Izumi), and hopes that this connection will give Segawa a valuable ‘in’ through which he can begin gathering information. Segawa finds the task easier than expected and soon begins getting results, but it all goes wrong when he finds himself the prime suspect in a murder case. However, Eiko’s sister, Toshiko (Shiho Fujimura), seems convinced of his innocence and willing to do anything she can to help him…
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| Shiho Fujimura |
Mikkokusha sees Jiro Tamiya in a typical role as an ambitious womaniser who’s not too big in the morals department – see also Black Test Car, Stolen Pleasure and, most notably, The Great White Tower (among others). Tamiya excelled at playing such characters, and was also an athletic type and proficient in karate – a useful skill when called upon to perform in action scenes, of which this film has a number of good ones in the second half. Unfortunately, his film career would soon go off the rails. In 1968, he complained to the bosses at Daiei studios about having been relegated to fourth billing on the posters for Tadashi Imai’s Fushin no toki (1968) below Ayako Wakao, Mariko Kaga and Mariko Okada despite having the lead role. Daiei changed the billing but fired him. Due to an arrangement between the five big film companies in Japan, this meant that none of the other studios would sign him and he had to make do with TV work and roles in occasional independent films (something similar had happened to Fujiko Yamamoto in 1963). In the following years, Tamiya embarked on a number of unsuccessful business ventures and suffered from health issues culminating in depression and a mental breakdown. He committed suicide with a hunting rifle in 1978 aged just 43.
Director Shigeo Tanaka (1907-1992) is generally regarded as a journeyman, but it’s an indication of the quality of Japanese cinema during this period that even the so-called hacks were, at the least, highly competent. Tanaka enjoyed a long career, making his first film in 1931, and his last in 1980. He’s probably best remembered for the ‘Woman Gambler’ series starring Kyoko Enami (who apparently replaced Ayako Wakao when the latter had to pull out for health reasons). Enami also appears here as Segawa’s girlfriend, but the plum female role goes to Shiho Fujimura, who is especially effective in her final scene. Yusuke Takita is also memorable as the suave and slippery Sawai.
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| Yusuke Takita |
The industrial espionage thriller became a subgenre of its own in 1960s Japanese cinema, although Mikkokusha focuses mainly on the murder mystery aspect of the plot. This is quite convoluted but pretty clever, and overall the film has a lot going for it, including some fine black-and-white ‘scope photography by Fujio Morita, who went on to shoot many of Hideo Gosha’s films.
The screenplay by Hajime Takaiwa was based on a just-published novel of the same name by Akimitsu Takagi later published in English translation by Soho Press in 2001 as The Informer. Takaiwa's adaptation is pretty faithful; although the aforementioned action scenes are not present in the book, they are a welcome addition as the story would have made for an overly talky film without them.
Thanks to Coralsundy for the English subtitles, which can be found here.
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