Cops Vs. Thugs

An unconventional Yakuza film, based on a real-life incident in Hiroshima, looks at the true roots of violence and its underground links to organised crime, the police and politics. The film is in a sense the reverse side of the story from Battles Without Honour and Humanity. Thorough research was done on location for the film by Kasahara Kazuo, who also wrote all four films in the Battles Without Honour and Humanity series. In a provincial town plagued by a gang war, a police inspector is ordered to investigate organised crime. He maintains close links with the leader of one of the two rival Yakuza gangs, a relationship based on their shared fate as comrades in arms on the seamy side of life. The contacts are a thorn in the flesh of a councillor and ex-Yakuza, who does everything he can behind the scenes to frustrate the relationship. As a result the two are filled with mutual mistrust so they have no choice but to fight each other. In the past violence was always shown from the perspective of the Yakuza, but this film offers the first analysis from the standpoint of the police. The film poses important questions about the fundamental relationship between power and justice and shows the social background to the violence, such as the struggle for authority within the police and the way Yakuza and politicians exploited this, each to their own ends. In order to expose the core of the drama, Fukasaku sought images that are very physical. One powerful example is the scene when the protagonist first makes an insignificant gang member (played by Kawatani Takuzo) undress and then subjects him naked to an interrogation.