Small-time crooks Shinichi and Teruo somehow get involved with
Shigemori's yakuza clan - but even their first assignement, stealing a
bagful of weapons from the rival Kajigawa gang, ends in a bit of a bungle
up, through no fault of their own, I might want to add, but everyone
blames them ... Shigemori wants to punish especialy Shinichi, but
Shigemori's moll Yumi has fallen in love with Shinichi, so she warns him,
and while on the run, Shinichi meets a stranger who out of the blue offers
to help him and who wants to take him with him to South America to run a
farm, too. To finance their life in South America, Shinichi and the
stranger decide to steal the bag full of weapons that started everything
from Shigemori, but instead they find Shigemori's men trying to torture
the whereabouts of Shinichi out of Teruo, so Shinichi and the stranger
save him instead. Soon, Shigemori's right-hand man Nakamoto manages to
track down Shinichi - and he offers him a deal: Shinichi is to kill
Shigemori (so Nakamoto can become boss) in exchange for his freedom and a
future with Yumi. If Shinichi disagrees, Nakamoto threatens to spill the
beans about his affair with Yumi to Shigemori, which would not affect him
personally but Yumi. Shinichi agrees of course. When Yumi learns about
the predicament Shinichi is in, she confesses everything to Shigemori, so
at the appointed time, when Shinichi is to shoot Shigemori, Shigemori
lures Nakamoto and his men into a trap and shoots them all. It's only then
that Shinichi makes a rather ill-adviced interference, and suddenly he
finds himself facing Shigemori's entire gang, and Shigemori wants him
dead, even if he had promised Yumi otherwise. It's only thanks to the
stranger that Shinichi is saved in the end, and the Kajigawa gang, whom
Yumi has called in to help out, erradicates the Shigemori gang, but Yumi
herself catches a bullet and dies in Shinichi's arms. ... and the boat
Shinichi to South America and the stranger wanted to take leaves without
them. Rather routine gangster drama with shades of film noir,
but the whole thing is well-paced, competently acted and directed, and it
features enough action to make it a piece of ok B entertainment. Nothing
special of course, but enjoyable still.
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