Tokyo Drifter

Director: Seijun Suzuki

1966 / 89min / DCP

Wearing a powder blue suit and immaculate white loafers, Tetsuya Watari’s sure shot wandering yakuza hitman Phoenix Tetsu cuts a stylish figure as he stays one step ahead of scheming rival gangs. During production Suzuki was himself at war with his Nikkatsu bosses, who’d warned him to curb his visual extravagances, and were repaid for their meddling with this garish, surreal Pop Art wig-out, which owes as much to the musical and Western as to the mobster pic.