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Because he has slain a Yakuza boss with a sword, Shinichi Tachibana
(Ken Takakura) is thrown into the slammer, Abashiri prison, where it seems
to be permanent winter and where the convicts work mainly as lumberjacks.
Initially, Tachibana finds it difficult to adjust, and he gets into a lot
of fights and is frequently thrown into solitary confinement. All this
changes though when his probation officer Tsubaki tells him his mother is
suffering from cancer - and probably won't live long enough to see him
being released from prison. Tachibana immediately realizes he has to get
out on parole just to visit his mother and tell her not to worry, so all
of a sudden he behaves like a model prisoner ...
Now all that would be just fine, until Tachibana's cellmates plan an
escape - and they more or less threaten to kill Tachibana should he refuse
to join them. However, their first try to escape is spoiled by their old
cellmate Akuta, whom they actually planned to murder because they couldn't
take him with them - but who all of a sudden turns out the most dangerous
hitman imaginable and puts all of them to their places.
One day while driving to work though Tachibana and the other convicts
make a rather clumsy attempt to just jump off the truck and make a run for
it ... but within minutes, all of the convicts are recaptured - all but
Tachibana and Gondo, Tachibana's arch-enemy. But now they have to make
good their escape together because they are cuffed together by the hand.
And once out of prison, Gondo proves to be a sly fox, as he purposely
beats up a woman who turns out to be probation officer Tsubaki's wife -
because only this way, he figures, he can keep Tachibana from giving
himself up. The two men thus have to make the best of it, and somehow they
manage to stay ahead of their pursuers for the longest time.
Then though they have one of these stupid ideas to get rid of their
cuffs - to lie down on the traintracks and let the next train cut the
chain apart - and the plan works, too, but while Tachibana comes out of it
unfazed - despite the fact he was the one who had to lie beneatht he train
itself - Gondo is severely injured. Now Tachibana could have left the man
who is his arch enemy anyways right then and there ... but when Gondo, of
all people, calls for his mama, that somehow touches Tachibana - who
himself hardly loves anyone but his own mum ... enter probation officer
Tsubaki, gun in hand, who is deterined to kill those who have beaten up
his wife. Tachibana immediately gives himself up, but he pleads for the
life of Gondo, for whom he has suddenly developed a soft spot. And seeing
Tachibana's gentle side, Tsubaki softens up as well and agrees to take
Gondo to a Doctor ... and at long last, Gondo admits that he has beaten up
Tsubaki's wife, and Tachibana had no part in it ...
Though not entirely free of kitsch and essentially not really
inventive, this is an effective little prison thriller. When it came first
out in Japan by the way it surprisingly became a tremendous success - and
had 17 (!) sequels until 1972 and made lead actor Ken Takakura a
superstar. While this film is a prison/prison escape movie in the purest
sense of the word, later films in the series would focus more on the
life outside.
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find Walls of Abashiri Prison at adultvideouniverse.com
