Radiance Films
Blu-ray Release: July 30, 2024
Video: 2.35:1/1080p/Color
Audio: Japanese LPCM 2.0 Mono
Subtitles: English
Run Time: 90:39
Director: Tai Kato
Trying to survive in the ruins of post-war Japan, Kawada (Noboru Ando) and Tsukada (Asao Koike) run afoul of the military police after stealing valuable copper wire. Kawada is arrested and sent to prison, but Tsukada uses their gains to start a yakuza gang. Facing violent inmates and a cruel warden (Tomisaburo Wakayama), Kawada vows to escape and stop his former partner. (From Radiance’s official synopsis)
During the ‘50s and early ‘60s, director Tai Kato was a journeyman for Toei Studios, churning out respectable, influential jidaigeki dramas, such as Warrior of the Wind (Japanese: Kaze no Bushi, 1961) and Cruelty Of The Shogunate’s Downfall (Japanese: Bakamatsu Zankoku Monogatari, 1964). Kato’s films were remembered for their grit, realism, and stylishness, all of which he also brought to a series of crime pictures, including psycho-thriller I, the Executioner (Japanese: Minagoroshi no reika, 1968), three films in the yakuza-themed Red Peony Gambler franchise (1969, ‘70, ‘71), and prison drama Eighteen Years in Prison (Japanese: Choueki juhachi-nen, 1967).
Eighteen Years in Prison uses the genre backdrops of a yakuza epic and prison story as a set dressing to explore a post-war country at its darkest. The early parts of the film depict desperation of multiple generations of people fighting to find their identity in the ruinous remnants of US occupied Japan. It's a raw experience with purposefully roughened edges and is quite violent for the era (especially the torture scenes). Still, even at its most angst-ridden, Eighteen Years in Prison avoids nihilism with its aggressive and eclectic style. It crackles with extreme camera angles, impressionistic lighting schemes, and flashy editing. And, anytime it threatens to tumble into despair, Hajime Kaburagi’s jazzy score swoops in to lighten the mood. This occasionally leads to tonal whiplash, as in the case one of the more emotionally intense sequences being preceded by a cheesecake girls’ baseball match, complete with vah-vah-voom music and close-ups on shapely butts.
What’s particularly unique about this film, as opposed to typical yakuza stories and analogous prison dramas, is the fact that, unlike the vast majority of Japanese criminal antiheroes, Kawada is never depicted as an overly-ambitious hoodlum learning the error of his ways. He is the victim of circumstance, as are most of his allies, and his actions are consistently virtuous – robbing authorities to feed the needy, defending other inmates from psychopathic bullies, and standing up to a sadistic guard, played by perennial heavy Tomisaburo Wakayama. Kawada’s steadfast morality threatens to stifle his arc, but he remains compelling as doing the right thing leads to more hardships and heartbreak.
Star Noboru Ando was a genuine juvenile delinquent and college dropout who formed the Ando-gumi yakuza family after the war, bringing an unprecedented level of authenticity to his performances. He even served six years in prison for ordering a failed hit before dissolving his criminal empire. After being approached to make a movie based on his life, Namio Yuasa’s Blood and the Law (Japanese: Chi to okite, 1965), Ando signed lucrative acting contracts with Shochiku and Toei, including appearances in Kato’s By a Man's Face You Shall Know Him (Japanese: Otoko no kao wa rirekisho, 1966) and Purgatory force: Assault case (Japanese: Ahendaichi jigokubutai totsugekseyo, 1966), and Kinji Fukasaku’s Street Mobster (Japanese: Gendai Yakuza: Hitokiri Yota, 1972) and Sympathy for the Underdog (Japanese: Bakuto Gaijin Butai, 1971). Ando returned for a sequel the same year, Parole (Japanese Chôeki jûhachi-nen: Kari shutsugoku; aka: Eighteen Years' Imprisonment: Parole, 1968), directed by Yasuo Furuhata.
The film shares its title with the non-fiction autobiographical book by Communist political prisoners Kyuichi Tokuda and Yoshio Shiga, first published in 1947. The two stories also take place around the same time, but are otherwise not related.
Bibliography:
Outlaw Masters of Japanese Film by Chris D. (I.B. Tauris, 2005)
The Yakuza Movie Book: A Guide to Japanese Gangster Films by Mark Schilling (Stone Bridge Press, 2003)
Video
It appears that Eighteen Years in Prison was never released on North American home video prior to this Blu-ray edition from Radiance Films. The 2.35:1, 1080p transfer was handed to the company directly by Toei, who seems to have used it for HD TV broadcasts. Red Peony series cinematographer Osamu Furuya’s gritty, yet stylish photography is well-represented with a consistent sheen of film grain, tight, but not overly sharpened details, and only minor print damage, some of which seems to be an in-camera lens issue. The transfer has this really nice, slightly uncanny color quality, similar to what you might see from a Technicolor print. The hues aren’t particularly vibrant – which makes sense, given the bleak subject matter and main location – but are pleasantly homogenized, especially the cool backdrops, warm skin tones, and saturated orange jumpsuits. Blacks are crushy, but don’t absorb a lot of vital detail.
Audio
Eighteen Years in Prison is presented in its original Japanese mono and LPCM 2.0. This is a pretty standard and simplified mix, but the most important element, dialogue, remains consistent and clean throughout. Incidental effects are also crisp and tidy and there are only a few issues with on-set sound overlapping and turning muddy. Hajime Kaburagi’s aforementioned jazzy score doesn’t crop up too often, but sounds pretty rich for a mono track when it does.
Extras
Appreciation by Tony Rayns (24:17, HD) – The critic, programmer, and all-around Asia cinema expert discusses Kato’s career and style (including clips from the other Kato movies Radiance has released), the stigma of yakuza movies, Ando’s life and career as actor, Eighteen Years in Prison, and how the film fits in the director’s filmography.
Tall Escapes (16:57, HD) – In this visual essay, critic and author of Agitator: The Cinema of Takashi Miike (FAB Press, 2006) Tom Mes explores Japanese prison movies, the war era’s lack of prison-based films, and various genre movies, including the long-running Abashiri Prison series, Eighteen Years in Prison, ero guro type movies, the Female Prisoner Scorpion movies and its ‘90s V-cinema knock-offs, Kôsaku Yamashita’s Yokosuka Navy Prison (Japanese: Kaigun Yokosuka keimusho, 1973), Sadao Nakajima’s The Rapacious Jailbreaker (Japanese: Datsugoku Hiroshima satsujinshû,1974), Takashii Miike’s Big Bang Love (Japanese: 46-okunen no koi, 2006), Toshiaki Toyoda’s 9 Souls (2003), Yôichi Sai’s Doing Time (Japanese: Keimusho no naka, 2002), and more.
Trailer
The images on this page are taken from the BDs and sized for the page. Larger versions can be viewed by clicking the images. Note that there will be some JPG compression.
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