Shirō Yanase

Acting

Shirō Yanase

Born — Died

1930-02-16 — 2021-01-04

Place of birth

Gunma Prefecture, Japan

Known for

Acting

Credits

60 titles

Known for

Youth of the Beast poster
6.9

When a mysterious stranger muscles into two rival yakuza gangs, Tokyo's underworld explodes with violence.

Youth of the Beast

1963

Thirteen Times a Loser poster
NR

Mineoka Group executive Okitsu Seiji is imprisoned for the 13th time for attacking rival Kuronuma. While in prison, he learns that the Kuronuma Group has retaliated by killing its leader and seizing territory. Upon his release, he embarks on a revenge campaign.

Thirteen Times a Loser

1969

A Slope in the Sun poster
5.9

The young Takako Kuramoto has come to Tokyo to study and starts working for the rich Tashiro family as tutor of the daughter, Kumiko, while she receives attention from her two older brothers, Yukichi and Shinji. Meanwhile, the exact parentage of Shinji comes to light.

A Slope in the Sun

1958

Man Who Causes a Storm poster
6.8

Shoichi Kokubun is a roughneck street musician, who has a brother that is determined to propel him into stardom. In attempt to catch the attention of a popular jazz band, his brother appeals to their manager who has the power to make him a star. In a graphic portrayal of love, betrayal and success, Shoichi brews up a storm with a 'rat-a-tat-tat' on the drums.

Man Who Causes a Storm

1957

Blind Woman's Curse poster
6.3

Akemi is a dragon tattooed leader of the Tachibana Yakuza clan. In a duel with a rival gang Akemi slashes the eyes of an opponent and a black cat appears, to lap the blood from the gushing wound. The cat along with the eye-victim go on to pursue Akemi’s gang in revenge, leaving a trail of dead Yakuza girls, their dragon tattoos skinned from their bodies.

Blind Woman's Curse

1970

Tokyo Knights poster
6.9

A college student takes over the family business in the field of organised crime.

Tokyo Knights

1961

Film credits

1970s · 5 titles

Blind Woman's Curse poster
6.3

Akemi is a dragon tattooed leader of the Tachibana Yakuza clan. In a duel with a rival gang Akemi slashes the eyes of an opponent and a black cat appears, to lap the blood from the gushing wound. The cat along with the eye-victim go on to pursue Akemi’s gang in revenge, leaving a trail of dead Yakuza girls, their dragon tattoos skinned from their bodies.

Blind Woman's Curse

1970

Woman's Police: Appointment with Danger poster
8.0

Kagari (Akira Kobayashi), a scout and overseer of Ginza bar hostesses, receives an urgent phone call from Sawako, a hostess at the bar Rie, and rushes to Tokyo International Airport to meet her. When he arrives she is gone. At the bar he learns that Tabuchi, a steady customer, had been quite friendly with Sawako and may know something. Tabuchi claims he knows nothing and Kagari lets the matter drop. Over time Kagari learns from Takijima, a businessman, that Sawako is in a hospital in Yokohama. Takijima explains that he found her in Singapore working as a street girl and brought her back to Japan. Sawako had lost her memory after being subjected to narcotics. Kagari swears to find the person responsible.

Woman's Police: Appointment with Danger

1970

Chivalrous Man: Junkyard of Life poster
NR

End of the Taisho period. In the city of Kiryu, where the wind is constantly blowing, the heads of the yakuza families of Kanhasshu (eight Kanto provinces) were to raise funds for the construction of the Chuji Kunisada monument. Responsible for the fundraiser was Jokichi from the Asami family, but Matsugoro from the Kuromatsu family, who wanted to become the greatest boss of the Kanhasshu yakuza, is trying to take over the textile market that Jokichi controls and intercept the fundraiser.

Chivalrous Man: Junkyard of Life

1971

Law of the Outlaw poster
9.0

Takei Goro leaves the gang to quit the yakuza world, but the gang won't allow it and relentlessly pursues Takei. This is Watari Tetsuya's first film to star in Shochiku.

Law of the Outlaw

1971

Peonies And Dragons poster
7.0

Yakuza Ryuichi, nicknamed the Dragon-killer, went on a journey with his son Tatsuo after he lost his wife. Due to Tatsuo's sudden illness, Ryuichi had money problems, and he became dependent on the head of the local tekiya and finds himself involved in the tekiya war with the Yakuza.

Peonies And Dragons

1970

1960s · 42 titles

Youth of the Beast poster
6.9

When a mysterious stranger muscles into two rival yakuza gangs, Tokyo's underworld explodes with violence.

Youth of the Beast

1963

Thirteen Times a Loser poster
NR

Mineoka Group executive Okitsu Seiji is imprisoned for the 13th time for attacking rival Kuronuma. While in prison, he learns that the Kuronuma Group has retaliated by killing its leader and seizing territory. Upon his release, he embarks on a revenge campaign.

Thirteen Times a Loser

1969

Tokyo Knights poster
6.9

A college student takes over the family business in the field of organised crime.

Tokyo Knights

1961

Everything Goes Wrong poster
6.7

Everything goes wrong when Jiro tries to break up his mother's relationship with a business man. The young rebel Jiro has to deal with an environment of crime and prostitution, and the impact of its choices on personal relationships: one with his mother, one with her business man lover and one with the girl in love with him.

Everything Goes Wrong

1960

Stardust Wharf poster
8.0

Hamada, Izumi, and Aki Jo, a rising singer from Toshiba Records, form a fresh trio who risk their youthful energy to bravely confront violence in this bright and cheerful coming-of-age action film.

Stardust Wharf

1968

A Colt is My Passport poster
7.1

A gang lord hires Kamimura, a hit man, to take out a rival boss who's gotten greedy.

A Colt is My Passport

1967

Smashing the 0-Line poster
6.3

Katiri is a reporter so ambitiously amoral that he’ll sell out anyone—including his partner and the drug dealer he’s sleeping with—to get a scoop. But what happens when an even more ruthless female gang boss kidnaps his sister?

Smashing the 0-Line

1960

Jungle Block poster
7.0

A young doctor falls into a despair of developments. He plans to revenge the disgrace inflicted upon his sister, whose engagement was broken as a result.

Jungle Block

1960

The Symbol of a Man poster
7.0

A Japanese intelligence officer faces personal crises in the years preceding the Manchurian conflict.

The Symbol of a Man

1963

Tattooed Life poster
7.2

After his own gang sets him up to kill a rival mobster, a hit man is forced to flee with his younger brother.

Tattooed Life

1965

The Incorrigible poster
7.2

Based on the loosely autobiographical novel of the same name by Toko Kon. Ken Yamanouchi stars as Togo Konno, the titular bastard.

The Incorrigible

1963

Acacia no Ame ga Yamu Toki poster
NR

Hideo Ishizaki, who was painting on the shore of the lake, saves a woman named Keiko.

Acacia no Ame ga Yamu Toki

1963

The Flower and the Angry Waves poster
7.2

A young yakuza in love with the girl who's to marry his clan oyabun, kidnaps the girl before fleeing with her. In Tokyo, he hides under the identity of a worker while the young woman becomes a waitress in a restaurant.

The Flower and the Angry Waves

1964

Carmen from Kawachi poster
6.2

Like a girl runaway, Tsuyu moves to Osaka to work as a bar hostess. She meets the owner of a model school, Yoko, and seriously thinks about becoming a fashion model. Yoko tells her that she can move in to Yoko’s house to take lessons, while making a living at the same time.

Carmen from Kawachi

1966

The Dragon Crest poster
NR

A violent story of loyalty and revenge among the many "yakuza" or gambling groups in Japan.

The Dragon Crest

1963

Black Strait poster
10.0

Newly out of prison after killing his boss' rival, Akio Maki is eager to move on and start a new life with the boss' daughter. However, the chains of the past are not so easily broken and Maki is soon ordered to kill again.

Black Strait

1964

Gambler's Dilemma poster
NR

The love story between a traveling guest and a geisha who inadvertently becomes the leader of her father's yakuza clan, after his death.

Gambler's Dilemma

1969

Otoko to otoko no ikiru machi poster
NR

1962 Japanese movie

Otoko to otoko no ikiru machi

1962

The Debt of Blood poster
NR

1967 Nikkatsu film.

The Debt of Blood

1967

Lone Rebel poster
8.0

Nomi-gumi, who plans to control Tama City, has begun to hurt Takase-gumi. Muraki, an executive, was entrusted with the destruction, but he was a brother of Takase-gumi's substitute, Tsukada. Muraki, who missed Tsukada and the old days at Tsukada's wife Shizue's shop, took the future of turning to the enemy painfully.

Lone Rebel

1969

Kanto Wanderer poster
6.6

Handsome young Katsuta tries to follow the yakuza code, but even his boss doesn't believe in it. Diamond Fuyu is less ethical, and allows the idiotic Tetsu to trick a schoolgirl he fancies, Hanako, into a type of bonded prostitution. Because of gang conflict, the Izu family (to whom Katsuta belongs) has their last gambling den taken over, and he seeks revenge. This brings him back into contact with a former lover who is also a card trickster - she is also Diamond Fuyu's sister, and is now married to Okaru-Hachi, who has mastered a clever card cheating trick called Okaru, which involves the deft use of mirrors.

Kanto Wanderer

1963

A Man with Dragon Tattoos poster
8.0

In the late 1890s, coal is a precious new natural resource. During an era of rapid economic growth, dreams are instilled into the lives of many across Japan. A vigorous young man with a look of fearless determination, sets foot on the northern part of Kyushu, an area where Yakuza thrived. His name is Kingoro Tamai (Yujiro Ishihara). With plans to travel the world, Kingoro worked diligently at a coal mine. His loyalty and hard work earned the respect of his peers, his courage won the heart of the beautiful Mon (Ruriko Asaoka), and his success evoked jealousy in his enemies.

A Man with Dragon Tattoos

1962

The Gun Like Lightning poster
NR

A young yakuza just released from prison for a crime he didn't commit, a police inspector determined to clean up the corruption in his own hometown, and a deranged assassin who lives to kill collide in a port town overrun by rival gangs, with two women, both stuck in relationships they are trying to escape from, stuck in-between.

The Gun Like Lightning

1960

The Cards Will Tell poster
NR

A 1960 crime film

The Cards Will Tell

1960

The Guys Who Put Money on Me poster
7.5

An unofficial sequel to Million Dollar Match (1961) which also starred Koji Wada as a young energetic boxer. This story deals more with betting action surrounding a boxing match, concentrating mostly on the high-powered Yakuza gambling dens.

The Guys Who Put Money on Me

1962

The Call of Blood poster
5.8

Two brothers seek revenge on the yakuza responsible for the death of their father.

The Call of Blood

1964

Fight of the Gamblers poster
6.0

Ryuji Oshima, a gambler, kills Saiga in self-defense, and considering himself unfit to lead men, secludes himself in a temple to atone for his misdeeds. At home, when his mother, the boss of a construction gang, bids for and gets the job of building the Town Hall, other gangs set out to disrupt her business and try to kill her.

Fight of the Gamblers

1963

Rising Dragon: Soft Skin Gambler poster
NR

Japanese crime film

Rising Dragon: Soft Skin Gambler

1969

Utau abarenbō poster
NR

1962 Japanese movie

Utau abarenbō

1962

The Dragon of Macao poster
8.0

Ryu (Akira Kobayashi) sets foot on the Yokohama port with a suitcase filled with 300 thousand dollars. He was sent by a jewelry company in Hong Kong to retrieve a certain diamond that was stolen from them. The "Himalayan Star" is worth couple hundred million yen and unbeknown to Ryu, it now lays in the hands of Aizu (Jo Shishido), the infamous ”Pirate of the Tokyo Bay."

The Dragon of Macao

1965

Teenage Yakuza poster
6.9

A high-school vigilante protects his community from the extortions of mobsters from a neighbouring city.

Teenage Yakuza

1962

Born Under Crossed Stars poster
6.6

A young man with a strong sense of justice is torn between two girls: the flighty Taneko and the serious Suzuko. With wisdom, courage and honor in a Japanese spirit of manliness he wins the day.

Born Under Crossed Stars

1965

The Aftermath of War poster
NR

After World War II life in Japan was hard. There was lawlessness, rapine, never enough food or money. One girl, raped by three men, called out the name of Kentaro before she died and this was something that people in this small section of downtown Tokyo remembered. Life went on, however, and local boss Hiramatsu Daizo decided to build a market, aided by his daughter Aya. They met opposition until one day a young man named Kentaro appears who it is rumored he was the vengeful lover of the murdered girl. He lives with Sabu and Yukari, the children the girl looked after before she died, and helps with the market, coming to the rescue with a bulldozer when Daizo is threatened by a rival group. When Daizo is finally killed, Kentaro carries on the work. Finally the market is completed, the rival group makes a last stand but is machine-gunned down by Kentaro who, after saying that he was not the one whose name the dying girl called out, leaves town for good.

The Aftermath of War

1967

Love and Desire in the Night Mist poster
NR

A film from Nikkatsu's "moodo akushon" (mood/action) subgenre.

Love and Desire in the Night Mist

1966

Wakai futari poster
NR

1962 Japanese movie

Wakai futari

1962

Living by Karate poster
6.5

Wada Kōji is a chivalrous young man who leads a group of youths that take on a yakuza boss.

Living by Karate

1961

Family Crest: Loyalty Offering Hell poster
NR

Nonaka Tetsugoro, a substitute for the Aoi group, held a flower party to celebrate the complete recovery of his boss. However, three rival bosses, trying to steal the Aoi's territory, made take-over plans in the shadows. The second in the two part Daimon series movies.

Family Crest: Loyalty Offering Hell

1969

The Rule for a Vagabond poster
NR

A brave warrior fights to restore peace to a town riddled by crime, one sword at a time, in this historical action saga.

The Rule for a Vagabond

1965

100 Gamblers poster
7.0

Set in Kyushu during the early Showa period, the son of a boss who is killed after a greedy boss takes over his territory, takes over and takes revenge on his nemesis.

100 Gamblers

1969

Million Dollar Smash-and-Grab poster
10.0

A boxing melodrama. Two friends become boxers and begin training for the championship. These two boys eventually face each other in the ring.

Million Dollar Smash-and-Grab

1961

Hawk of the Harbour poster
9.0

A Nikkatsu Action film with Yujiro Ishihara as the head of a small shipping company who gets harassed by the yakuza.

Hawk of the Harbour

1967

A World For Two poster
NR

On a passenger ship to Japan, the journalist Kawase encounters a man who claims to be a Filipino, but Kawase believes he is a murder suspect who fled Japan fifteen years ago, Hojo Shuichi. To throw Kawase off, the man talks a female passenger, Reiko, into acting as if she was his long-time friend. When the man - who is, in fact, Hojo - secretly leaves the ship, Reiko, who has fallen for him, joins up with Kawase to go looking for him. Meanwhile, Hojo, who has returned to Japan to find the true murderer before the 15-year statute of limiitations on murder expires, tracks down the man whom he believes ordered the murder he was accused of.

A World For Two

1966

1950s · 13 titles

A Slope in the Sun poster
5.9

The young Takako Kuramoto has come to Tokyo to study and starts working for the rich Tashiro family as tutor of the daughter, Kumiko, while she receives attention from her two older brothers, Yukichi and Shinji. Meanwhile, the exact parentage of Shinji comes to light.

A Slope in the Sun

1958

Man Who Causes a Storm poster
6.8

Shoichi Kokubun is a roughneck street musician, who has a brother that is determined to propel him into stardom. In attempt to catch the attention of a popular jazz band, his brother appeals to their manager who has the power to make him a star. In a graphic portrayal of love, betrayal and success, Shoichi brews up a storm with a 'rat-a-tat-tat' on the drums.

Man Who Causes a Storm

1957

Red Pier poster
6.5

Shortly after arriving in Kobe, "Jiro the Lefty", a killer with a natural talent, witnesses a man die in a crane accident which turns out to be a cover-up for a murder. Jiro soon finds himself on the run, tailed by a determined cop.

Red Pier

1958

Underworld Beauty poster
5.9

The moment he's released from prison, the honorable gangster Miyamoto recovers the stolen diamonds he had stashed before getting pinched. When he returns to his haunt to make good by friend who took a bullet for him, he is diverted by the greedy boss Oyane and his insatiable taste for Miyamoto's precious stones.

Underworld Beauty

1958

The Three Faces poster
10.0

Five years have passed since the three comrades who saved their lives in the Burma Campaign, namely Kenichiro Kishi, Eiji Shiga, and Daizo Kobayashi, promised to meet again five years later at the platform of Tokyo Station. Meanwhile, Shinagawa Station's crowded with repatriates. Upon returning to their homeland, their lives have changed dramatically. Daizo works as a railway construction worker. Eiji has established himself as a boxer. Kenichiro's become a gangster. In 1955, the day of their reunion is approaching. Now it is a matter of whether the three will be able to meet each other at the platform of Tokyo Station, as they had agreed on back in 1950.

The Three Faces

1955

Break Down that Wall poster
7.5

A man is wrongfully accused of murder.

Break Down that Wall

1959

The Perfect Game poster
6.2

College students come up with a scam to rob a gambling house. When it comes time to collect, the money isn't there, leading the young men into even more serious crime.

The Perfect Game

1958

I Am Waiting poster
6.5

A former boxer gets involved with a club hostess trying to escape the clutches of her gangster employer.

I Am Waiting

1957

Frankie the Milkman poster
8.5

Roppeita is big in size, clumsy and full of energy. When his grandfather orders him to move out to Tokyo to save a sinking milk delivery business a distant relative of his runs, he encounters the most strangest of clientele.

Frankie the Milkman

1956

Season of the Sun poster
6.6

The film tells the story of a group of high school boxing team members who spend their days drinking, sailing and chasing girls, and who more often than not spend their nights getting into brawls. In particular, it focuses upon Tatsuya, a sullen young man, who falls in love with Eiko, a proud upper-class girl.

Season of the Sun

1956

Song of the Underworld poster
NR

A conflict between two yakuza families in Tokyo, the Izus and the Yoshidas, has recently broken out. When an Izu underling starts a fight with a Yoshida man, Fuyu, the Izu family sends Tsuruta, a senior member of the clan, to make a personal apology to Fuyu. Tsuruta discovers that the woman he is in love with is Fuyu's sister, Tatsuko. Tsuruta ends up gambling with a swindler, who is in fact Tatsuko's husband. (The general plot of the film was re-used for Seijun Suzuki's Kanto Wanderer).

Song of the Underworld

1956

Tomorrow is Another Day poster
NR

The story of three brothers who struggle to shake free of the father's ties to the yakuza underworld. A star vehicle for the popular singer/actor Yūjirō Ishihara.

Tomorrow is Another Day

1958

The Man Who Rode the Typhoon poster
NR

This typhoon spectacle is bursting with the charm of tough guy Yujiro, a student of architecture at Hokkaido University, who takes on a conspiracy involving a mysterious accidental death at a construction site.

The Man Who Rode the Typhoon

1958