Black Society trilogy

The Kuroshakai trilogy (黒社会三部作, Kuro-shakai Sanbusaku), also known as the Black Society trilogy, is a series of films directed by Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike involving Chinese triads and Japanese yakuza.[1]

Black Society trilogy
Directed byTakashi Miike
Screenplay by
  • Ichirō Fujita
  • Seigo Inoue
  • Ichiro Ryu
StarringTomorowo Taguchi
Release date
CountryJapan
Language

The series includes three separate films without storyline crossovers, and were each released two years apart between 1995–1999. Tomorowo Taguchi plays a prominent role in all three of the films, albeit as a different character in each.

The term kuro-shakai is a Japanese word literally meaning "black society" or underworld.

Films
Year English title Japanese title Translation Screenplay
1995 Shinjuku Triad Society 新宿 黒社会 チャイナ マフィア 戦争
Shinjuku Kuroshakai: Chaina Mafia Sensō		 Shinjuku Underworld: Chinese Mafia War Ichirō Fujita
1997 Rainy Dog 極道 黒社会 RAINY DOG
Gokudō Kuroshakai: Rainy Dog		 Gangster Underworld: Rainy Dog Seigo Inoue
1999 Ley Lines 日本 黒社会 LEY LINES
Nihon Kuroshakai: Ley Lines		 Japan Underworld: Ley Lines Ichiro Ryu

Reception

Grady Hendrix of The New York Sun, commented on the Trilogy, noting that "the three movies that make up his loosely related Black Society Trilogy are the work of a socially committed, ferociously intelligent director - albeit one who still takes time out from raging against the machine for raunchy sex jokes and blunt-force trauma."[2]

Jasper Sharp of the British Film Institute commented on the series, stating that among Miike's gangster films, the trilogy was "widely seen as among his best" with "Miike’s fast-paced cutting, acutely-developed and innovative mise-en-scène and hyperbolic approach to onscreen violence spring to the fore, although there is plenty more going on beneath the bombastic onscreen onslaught."[3]

References
  1. Davis, Carl (8 January 2005). "Takashi Miike's Black Society Trilogy". DVD Talk.
  2. Hendrix, Grady (26 August 2008). "Takashi Miike's Crime Wave". The New York Sun. p. 11.
  3. Sharp, Jasper (18 January 2017). "10 great Japanese gangster movies". British Film Institute. Retrieved 23 January 2017.


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