New Battles Without Honor and Humanity 2: Head of the Boss (Japan, 1975 )

Nathan's review:

 Kuroda (Bunta Sugawara), a Yakuza with no affiliations, takes on a job from Tetsu (Tsutomo Yamazaki), an Owada Family lieutenant and ends up assassinating a rival boss in his place landing him 7 years in prison. On his release Kuroda returns to Hiroshima looking forward to receiving a large sum of money for his service, but instead finds Tetsu abandoned by Owada and strung out on heroin. Determined to get his money, Kuroda ends up involved in a succession dispute over leadership of the family due to Lietenant Aihara's (Mikio Narita) scheming ways.

If 'New Battles' is the perfect gateway to Kinji Fukasaku's filmography, then 'Boss's Head' is the Greatest hits compilation of his work until that point. Armed with a much stronger script, courtesy of legendary Yakuza writer Koji Takada, Boss' Head is a considerably better film than its predecessor that combines all the key elements of the Jitsuroku genre into one neat little package. The nihilistic tone and brutal violence of Outlaw Killers, the betrayals and backroom politicking of Battles, the strong (if minor) female characters of New Battles, the cool of Sympathy, the scathing undertones of Wolves, etc etc.

But all that aside, the film stands out as a fine film by its own merits as a somewhat toned down stylistically Fukasaku (you would sometimes be forgiven for thinking it's more akin to a Sadao Nakajima film at points), crafts another 90 minutes of mayhem amongst the Hiroshima Yakuza. Much more violent and raw than the first New Battles, this one hits the ground running with a heroin fuelled bumbling assassination that leads to a vicious attempted prison rape, that Kuroda foils with the aid of a large serrated knife to a prisoners face. There's also an absolutely brutal stabbing scene as one of Kuroda's men takes revenge for the loss of a heroin shipment that remains shocking to this day.

It should be mentioned too, that the stunning finale is preceded by a glorious car chase as Kuroda and a couple of his men cause chaos when they attempt an assassination by way of a highway hit. Its executed remarkably well and is an interesting precursor to the vehicular carnage that Fukasaku would go on to perfect in Violent Panic a year later.

There's some interesting characters in this one, with a couple of new additions to the cast of the Battles series when taken as a whole. Tsutomo Yamazaki is absolutely terrific as Tetsu, the ex rising star of the Owada Family who is married to the Boss's daughter. He's spiralling deeper and deeper into addiction, causing friction with everyone around him and Yamazaki's performance reflects that magnificently with his gaunt features and constantly twitching demeanour, he also gets one of the films absolute best sequences as he crashes a party desperately looking for cash or a fix, only to be manipulated into a murder by Aihara.

There is much made of Meiko Kaji being underused or under utilised in reviews for this one too, which is understandable given her popularity in the West, but is something I disagree with a lot. She plays a crucial role (and does it very well of course) but any more would of broken the pacing and undermined her characters role in my opinion, particularly when you consider the outcome of her relationship with Tetsu, as Kinji Fukasaku himself said "Its hard to tell a woman's story when you're dealing with an exlusively male world". Yuriko Hishimi also delivers a brilliant performance as Aya, a beautiful and opportunistic hostess who fully utilises her feminine wiles to slide between different Yakuza looking for a way to make her way to the top, surprisingly she even outshines the great Meiko Kaji and gives one of the films strongest roles real character.

Bunta Sugawara gets to stretch his legs a little more this time too, as he swings between unhinged and effortlessly cool in a way that not many others could and he makes for a fine pairing alongside Yamazaki (damn I wish he made more Jitsuruko), with the two sharing quite the chemistry on-screen together. Elsewhere the underrated, but always fantastic Mikio Narita is the scheming manipulator Aihara, who wants to take the top spot in the Owada Family by any means necessary and the legendary Ko Nishimura is great as the Boss. And naturally, the Piranha's themselves are scattered throughout to posture, murder and die as was their business.

I really enjoyed revisiting this, while it borrows elements from Fukasaku's previous work and explores themes that he worked with better later on, it's still an excellent slice of Jitsuroku mayhem all by itself. A dark, 90 minute ride, that's paced perfectly with plenty of ultraviolence and machismo courtesy of some of Toei's finest. Whats not to love?