Director: Seijun Suzuki
Screenplay: Susumu Saji
Starring: Michitarô Mizushima, Mari Shiraki, Shinsuke Ashida, Tôru Abe, Hideaki Nitani, Setsuko Amamiya
Country: Japan
Running Time: 87 min
Year: 1958
BBFC Certificate: TBC
Seijun Suzuki was only 2 years into his career as a director in 1958 when he made Underworld Beauty, but it was his seventh film and the first to be credited to his assumed name Seijun Suzuki (previously he’d been using his real name, Seitarō Suzuki). It was made several years before he ruffled feathers at Nikkatsu but his early work still often shows some of the director’s bold stylistic quirks.
I’ve enjoyed what I’ve seen of Suzuki’s work a great deal, so I was keen to check out Underworld Beauty when Radiance Films offered me a chance to review their Blu-ray release of the film. It would be the earliest of the director’s films I’ve currently seen, so I wondered how it compared to his more ‘out there’ work from the late ’60s and beyond.
Underworld Beauty sees Michitarō Mizushima play Miyamoto, a tough gangster who’s just been released from prison. He heads straight over to see Oyane (Shinsuke Ashida), his old boss, and says he wants to sell the diamonds he stole in the heist that put him in jail. Miyamoto doesn’t want to do this for his own gain though, he wants to pay back Mihara (Tōru Abe), who was crippled during the botched job.
Oyane agrees to set up a deal but it turns sour, when some masked bandits try to take the diamonds for themselves. Panicking, Mihara swallows the stones and jumps off the side of the building, whose roof they were meeting on.
Mihara dies in hospital soon after but Oyane wants the diamonds out of the body. He never gets a chance to be alone with the corpse to extract the stones though, believing them to be lost once Mihara gets cremated.
However, a young sculptor named Arita (Hiroshi Kondō), who’s in a loose relationship with Mihara’s sister, Akiko (Mari Shiraki), does get a moment alone with the body. He takes his chance and secretly cuts the diamonds out for himself.
Meanwhile, Miyamoto has been following Akiko, feeling duty-bound to look after Mihara’s wayward sister. He discovers the truth about the diamonds and gets caught up in a violent feud over the valuable stones, as he wants them to go to Akiko to help put her on the straight and narrow.
The previous year, Seijun Suzuki had made another film with the same stars, called The Naked Woman and the Gun. Following this up with Underworld Beauty, you can see Nikkatsu were trying to use the ‘sex sells’ technique of marketing at this period of time. Our heroine here, Akiko, isn’t your typical feminine figure though. We’re introduced to her when she’s posing naked (though amusingly covered in shot by a nude sketch) and she does wield her sexuality in the film but in a more up-front manner than might be expected for the time.
The way Mari Shiraki moves, talks and acts is anything but demure. She can’t keep still, constantly running around or shifting position. She even climbs a tree randomly at one point. She was known as a dancer and often danced in her films. She does a little here too, but that skill is instead largely used to give her a great physicality in general.
This wild heroine helps the film feel like a precursor to the New Wave youth movies that would appear at the turn of the next decade.
Though Shiraki is an attention-grabbing presence throughout the film, sadly the narrative is still driven forward by our male hero, Miyamoto, who has to come to her rescue towards the end. However, I appreciated how Suzuki avoided getting them romantically involved. Miyamoto is helping Akiko merely to honour his debt to the friend he wronged.
Underworld Beauty was Suzuki’s first Cinemascope film and he makes great use of the wide frame with some artful compositions. It’s perhaps not as stylistically quirky as some of the director’s later films but there are still some witty visual ‘gags’. There’s some well-designed camera movement too and a wonderfully noir-ish use of low key lighting.
The film also moves briskly along, making for an exhilarating watch when paired with the energy of its female protagonist.
Overall then, Underworld Beauty is a stylish and lively gangster movie with a radically sexy, youth-movie twist. It might not be as blatantly offbeat as Suzuki’s later work but it still has some unique flourishes and is plenty of fun, regardless.
Film:
Underworld Beauty is out on 27th January on region A&B Blu-Ray, released by Radiance Films. The transfer is great, with a detailed image, minimal damage and pleasing tonal balance. I’ve used screengrabs throughout this review to give you an idea of how it looks, though these have been compressed. It sounds decent too, though there’s a little hiss and crackle in places, due to the age of the film.
LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES
– New 4K restoration of the film by Nikkatsu Corporation
– Uncompressed mono PCM audio
– New interview with critic Mizuki Kodama (2024, 15 mins)
– Bonus feature: Seijun Suzuki’s Love Letter (1959, 40 mins)
– Audio commentary on Love Letter by Suzuki biographer William Carroll (2024)
– Trailers
– Newly improved English subtitle translation
– Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow
– Limited edition booklet featuring new writing by critic Claudia Siefen-Leitich and an archival review of the film
– Limited edition of 3000 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings
The biggest bonus on the disc is the inclusion of a whole other film by Seijun Suzuki, titled Love Letter. It’s credited on the disc as a ‘feature’ but at 40 minutes it treads an unusual line between short and feature-length. However you classify it though, it’s a generous extra and I’ll give it a quick review here.
Love Letter seems like quite a departure from Suzuki’s usual work, or at least from the films he’s most famous for in the West. It’s a romantic melodrama that centres around Kozue (Hisako Tsukuba), a young pianist, whose love of her life, Masao (Kyōsuke Machida) is forced to live alone in the mountains due to ill health. The pair exchange letters, but when these slow down and one suggests Masao doesn’t love Kozue anymore, she’s heartbroken. Ryota (Frank Nagai), who’s the manager of the club Kozue works in and pines for her himself, says she should go up to the mountains and see Masao. Kozue does as suggested but finds that Masao isn’t acting quite himself anymore.
Love Letter is a kayo film, where the story was built around the title of a popular song, to make it act as a vehicle for the singer. In this case, the song was ‘Love Letter’ (of course), performed by Frank Nagai. Interestingly, Shohei Imamura had made a similar title for Nagai early on in his career called Nishi Ginza Station, which I reviewed a number of years ago.
Love Letter has some gorgeous location photography. It’s a handsome, lavish-looking affair in general, for a short B-movie. However, the melodrama is laid on thick and I found it rather overwrought for such a simple story. Those with a taste for swooning old-fashioned romance might enjoy it more than I did though.
There’s a commentary on the disc, but surprisingly it’s over Love Letter and not Underworld Beauty. William Carroll provides the track. He opens by describing how he feels films like this, which seem less typical to Western fans of Seijun Suzuki, are perhaps more interesting to him. He also discusses how traces of Suzuki’s more popular later work can be seen here. His commentary is well-researched and fascinating. I was particularly surprised to hear how actress Hisako Tsukuba went on to become a producer, helping kickstart the careers of Joe Dante and James Cameron!
Mizuki Kodama is also interviewed on the disc and she discusses Underworld Beauty. She explores the role and performance of lead actress Mari Shiraki as well as looks at gender identity in Suzuki’s films.
The booklet contains an essay by Claudia Siefen-Leitich. She carefully analyses the film, looking at how Suzuki uses cinematic tools to tell his story. There’s also an archival review from Kinema Junpo as well as the usual credit information and production stills.
Overall, Radiance have put together an enjoyable package with a whole extra film to enjoy. Fans of Seijun Suzuki have reason to rejoice and should pick this up if they haven’t already.
Disc/package:
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