Lambert (Coluche) is a melancholy, alcoholic gas station attendant that works the night shift with no drive in life. One evening a young man named Bensoussan stumbles into Lambert’s life while fleeing the cops, igniting a spark of friendship that Lambert hasn’t felt in a very long time. We come to find out that Bensoussan…
Eighteen Years in Prison [Radiance] Blu-ray Review
Noboru Ando plays Kawada, a former soldier of a suicide squadron in WWII who is now trying to find meaning in his life and forms a gang with his friend Tsukada (Asao Koike) to steal goods from occupying American soldiers in order to setup an organization to take care of the families of fallen Japanese…
Bandits of Orgosolo [Radiance Films] Blu-ray Review
Michele and his little brother Peppeddu are Sardinian shepherds who manage to just barely scape by in their quiet and dignified life. Their lives are shattered when three bandits rustling pigs cross paths with them. When Michele is forced to give refuge to the bandits on the run from the law, he is mistakenly accused…
Sympathy for the Underdog [Radiance Films] Blu-Ray Review
Kôji Tsuruta is Gunji, a yakuza who has spent the last ten years in prison after partnering with the Daikato gang to take out a rival clan. Upon his return to Yokohama, he finds that the Daikato have basically taken over the town under the guise of going straight. Gunji decides to start over in…
Shinobi [Radiance Films] Blu-ray Box Set Review
In Shinobi: Band of Assassins, Goemon Ishikawa (Ichikawa Raizo) is a promising young pupil who is shown particular favor by shadowy ninja clan master Sandayu (Yunosuke Ito). Sandayu secretly sets up Goemon in a scheme to push him to assassinate the Japanese warlord Ode Nobunaga who is trying to consolidate power amidst the feuding territories….
The Shape of Night [Radiance Films] Blu-ray Review
The film introduces us to a jaded prostitute named Yoshie Nomoto (Miyuki Kuwano who I recognized from Kurosawa’s Red Beard as well as her earlier performances for Nagisa Oshima in Cruel Story of Youth and Night and Fog in Japan) whose latest client takes a shine to her and want to rescue her from the…
Black Tight Killers [Radiance Films] Blu-ray Review
We open on some awesome jazzy music over the production logo which leads into the introduction of our main man, Daisuke Honda, war photographer, in the midst of the most fireworks-filled battle sequence I’ve come across in a film. Then we get a totally groovy go-go dancing opening credits sequence after which we jump forward…
Le Combat Dans L’Ile Blu-ray Review [Radiance Films]
Clément (Jean-Louis Trintignant) is living a double life. Unbeknownst to his former actress wife Anne (an always ethereal Romy Schneider) in a marriage ranging from shaky to actively hostile, he is secretly a right-wing terrorist. Clément is forced to flee the city with Anne after a botched assassination attempt. He heads to the countryside and…
Elegant Beast – Blu-ray Review (Radiance Films)
Tomoko (Yûko Hamada) and her brother Minoru (Manamitsu Kawabata) are bad kids! They lie constantly and they cheat everyone they meet. But that’s okay for their parents, because they taught them how! Mom and dad, ex-soldier Tokizo Maeda (Yûnosuke Itô) and his wife Yoshino (Hisano Yamaoka), are a pair of slimeballs that have moved into…
The Facts of Murder – Blu-ray Review (Radiance Films)
Two crimes occur in an old apartment building in Rome just a few days apart. The first, a suspicious robbery of a bachelor and the second, the brutal stabbing of the woman living just next door. Inspector Ingravallo (Pietro Germi) is called in to solve both cases and his tough, no-nonsense approach immediately begins to…