Directed by Akira Kurosawa • 1960 • Japan
Starring Toshiro Mifune, Masayuki Mori, Tatsuya Mihashi
A young executive hunts down his father’s killer in director Akira Kurosawa’s scathing THE BAD SLEEP WELL. Continuing his legendary collaboration with actor Toshiro Mifune, Kurosawa combines elements of “Hamlet” and American film noir to chilling effect in exposing the corrupt boardrooms of postwar corporate Japan.
Up Next in Japanese Noir
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Intimidation
Directed by Koreyoshi Kurahara • 1960 • Japan
Koreyoshi Kurahara's ingeniously plotted, pocket-size noir concerns the intertwined fates of a desperate bank manager, blackmailed for book-cooking, and his resentful but timid underling, passed over for a promotion. The marvelously moody Intimidatio...
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Zero Focus
Directed by Yoshitaro Nomura • 1961 • Japan
Starring Yoshiko Kuga, Hizuru Takachiho, Ineko ArimaAfter her husband disappears on a business trip, newlywed Teiko (Yoshiko Kuga) realizes she knows very little about the man she has been married to for only a week. With a pair of mysterious photogra...
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Pigs and Battleships
Directed by Shohei Imamura • 1962 • Japan
Starring Jitsuko Yoshimura, Yoko Minamida, Hiroyuki NagatoA dazzling, unruly portrait of postwar Japan, PIGS AND BATTLESHIPS details, with escalating absurdity, the desperate power struggles between small-time gangsters in the port town of Yokosuka. Sho...