Yoshihiro Ishimatsu

Writing

Yoshihiro Ishimatsu

Born — Died

1932-06-01 — 2025-11-28

Place of birth

Iizuka, Fukuoka, Japan

Known for

Writing

Credits

40 titles

Known for

Beijing Watermelon poster
7.0

Shunzo is a popular greengrocer in a town near Tokyo. His life, and the lives of his wife Michi, and their two children, undergoes a dramatic change when he encounters Li, a poor college student from China.

Beijing Watermelon

1989

Rogue poster
7.0

Coal miner Isamu Oba is forced to quit his village and leave his mother and siblings behind. Mining buddy Ichiro accompanies him to Tokyo, and the pair enjoy several "fish-out-of-water" sequences before finding employment at a boxing gym with trainer Sawada and his spunky sister Tomoko. The boys also find part time night jobs as roving minstrels in the club district courtesy of benevolent gang boss Asakawa. Of course, they run afoul of boss Karasawa's cruel gang. Karasawa also has it in for Asakawa, and this indirectly throws a spanner into the works as far as Isamu's burgeoning success as a kickboxer. When Asakawa's HQ is burned to the ground by Karasawa's men, Asakawa tries to kill Karasawa - which, of course, leads to his own gruesome death. Isamu goes on the rampage with his sword, wiping out Karasawa and men.

Rogue

1968

Apartment Wife: Unforgettable Night poster
7.0

A married office lady is assaulted in the dark at a company outing. At work she doesn’t know who to suspect but thoughts of the attack strangely excite her.

Apartment Wife: Unforgettable Night

1972

Street Mobster poster
6.8

After serving time, a defiant street thug is incensed to find his town overrun by two yakuza factions. He gathers his crew and takes them on.

Street Mobster

1972

Retaliation poster
5.9

Emerging from a stint in prison, yakuza lieutenant Sumukawa discovers that his gang has disintegrated. An ambitious type, he quickly hooks up with another gang who promise him a prominent position if he helps them deal with a rival family. But bonds are made to be broken, and pledges of loyalty soon give way to competition, betrayal and — naturally — retaliation.

Retaliation

1968

Black Test Car poster
7.1

Two car manufacturers spy on each other to try to find out details and prices of a new sports car each is about to launch.

Black Test Car

1962

Behind the camera

Beijing Watermelon poster
7.0

Shunzo is a popular greengrocer in a town near Tokyo. His life, and the lives of his wife Michi, and their two children, undergoes a dramatic change when he encounters Li, a poor college student from China.

Beijing Watermelon

1989

Rogue poster
7.0

Coal miner Isamu Oba is forced to quit his village and leave his mother and siblings behind. Mining buddy Ichiro accompanies him to Tokyo, and the pair enjoy several "fish-out-of-water" sequences before finding employment at a boxing gym with trainer Sawada and his spunky sister Tomoko. The boys also find part time night jobs as roving minstrels in the club district courtesy of benevolent gang boss Asakawa. Of course, they run afoul of boss Karasawa's cruel gang. Karasawa also has it in for Asakawa, and this indirectly throws a spanner into the works as far as Isamu's burgeoning success as a kickboxer. When Asakawa's HQ is burned to the ground by Karasawa's men, Asakawa tries to kill Karasawa - which, of course, leads to his own gruesome death. Isamu goes on the rampage with his sword, wiping out Karasawa and men.

Rogue

1968

Apartment Wife: Unforgettable Night poster
7.0

A married office lady is assaulted in the dark at a company outing. At work she doesn’t know who to suspect but thoughts of the attack strangely excite her.

Apartment Wife: Unforgettable Night

1972

Street Mobster poster
6.8

After serving time, a defiant street thug is incensed to find his town overrun by two yakuza factions. He gathers his crew and takes them on.

Street Mobster

1972

Retaliation poster
5.9

Emerging from a stint in prison, yakuza lieutenant Sumukawa discovers that his gang has disintegrated. An ambitious type, he quickly hooks up with another gang who promise him a prominent position if he helps them deal with a rival family. But bonds are made to be broken, and pledges of loyalty soon give way to competition, betrayal and — naturally — retaliation.

Retaliation

1968

Black Test Car poster
7.1

Two car manufacturers spy on each other to try to find out details and prices of a new sports car each is about to launch.

Black Test Car

1962

Black Report poster
6.6

After a businessman is murdered, an investigation identifies a suspect who is then put on trial for that crime.

Black Report

1963

Gateway to Glory poster
8.3

A young man leaves his widowed mother on her improverished farm and makes his career in the Japanese navy.

Gateway to Glory

1969

Organized Violence II poster
7.5

No synopsis available yet.

Organized Violence II

1967

A Hoodlum At The Risk Of His Life poster
9.0

A reporter is framed for murder while investigating organized crime. Upon being released from prison the plan for his revenge unravels.

A Hoodlum At The Risk Of His Life

1970

The Creature Called Man poster
7.5

A top police-guard, charged with protecting a visiting politician and ruthless dictator, contends with an assassin set to kill the man.

The Creature Called Man

1970

Internal Sleuth poster
7.5

When 150 guns are stolen from Iwakuni base and two police officers are shot dead, a detective criminal tries to find out the truth.

Internal Sleuth

1973

Quarreling with Yakuza poster
5.0

Set loose in a postwar world with no rules, an ex-juvenile delinquent begins building the most powerful gang in Tokyo's glittering Shibuya ward.

Quarreling with Yakuza

1973

3,000 Kilometer Trap poster
NR

A young man has to deliver a Mitsubishi Galant GTO from Kagoshima (on the southern tip of the southern Japanese island of Kyushu) 3000 kilometers across the length of Japan to the northern island of Hokkaido.

3,000 Kilometer Trap

1971

Play It Cool poster
5.0

This Japanese melodrama chronicles the exploits of a geisha's beautiful daughter. The daughter is the geisha's pride and she spares nothing to insure that she has a bright future. But the hard-working young woman's dreams of becoming a dressmaker are shattered.... She then becomes a nightclub hostess who plays cards with male patrons using her body as the prize.

Play It Cool

1970

The Gambler's Counterattack poster
8.5

Aiba is a gang boss who has just got out of jail, and finds everything has changed. His old gang has broken up, and only a few people still respect him. So he becomes a consultant to another gang who are about to be clobbered by a much larger gang moving in from out of town. Aiba proves a crafty tactician, and does very well at playing gangs off against each other in order to save the smaller gang. His advice is not always taken by those he tries to help, but he is generally proved right.

The Gambler's Counterattack

1971

The Drifting Avenger poster
6.1

Ken, son of a former samurai settles with his family in the west from Japan. Soon his family is killed in front of him by stagecoach robbers, making him aim to get revenge. Marvin an experienced gunman befriends Ken and becomes his mentor.

The Drifting Avenger

1968

The Hot Little Girl poster
4.7

A model gets involved with some gangsters trying to pull a big deal.

The Hot Little Girl

1970

Black Sea of Trees poster
NR

Sachiko's beloved sister Nobuko was supposed to go to Tohoku when she suddenly dies in a car accident in Hamamatsu. Sachiko begins to trace her sister's friendships to unravel the mystery of her mysterious death...

Black Sea of Trees

1960

A Certain Killer poster
6.9

A former soldier, reduced to working at a restaurant post-war, becomes a contract killer for the yakuza gangs he's in contact with.

A Certain Killer

1967

Fifteen Boys Adrift poster
6.5

A troop of children from eight to thirteen, abandoned on an island, struggling for life in the midst of passion fueled by the differences of nationalities. A story in the style of Robinson Crusoe revisited by Jules Verne.

Fifteen Boys Adrift

1982

The Cheating Underworld poster
4.8

Gangsters are robbed of five hundred million yen.

The Cheating Underworld

1968

The Ando Gang Documentary Film poster
6.5

This biopic of notorious yakuza-turned-actor Noboru Ando focuses on the days leading to his arrest after the shooting of businessman Hideki Yokoi.

The Ando Gang Documentary Film

1973

Everybody, Let's Go! poster
9.0

A new stationmaster is appointed to a dilapidated local line. On top of the failing local line feuding for hot spring customers with a bus company looking to start a new route, they even get involved in a disappearance and a murder...

Everybody, Let's Go!

1967

City of Beasts poster
6.0

University student Arima Yasuhiro becomes acquainted with Ishihama, the president of a pharmaceutical company with a dark past, slowly but surely getting more embroiled in his dirty dealings.

City of Beasts

1970

The Private Police poster
7.5

After the war, Kijima (Bunta Sugawara) returns to Tokyo where he meets Ôba (Noboru Andô), an Ex-Kamikaze pilot, and the two ruffians gather hooligans to join their group. In Ginza, the Togawa gang have taken over Sakurada's territory. After several fights Kijima and Ôba gain control of the territory by chasing out the notorious Togawa Group in the name of Sakurada. But Kijima is arrested for assaulting an American soldier. A few years pass. Kijima has served his prison term and the sears of war have been erased from Ginza. Ôba is now president of a company specializing in collection of bad debts, cheque frauds and everything that means money. People call their organization the “Private Police,” and Kijima begins to work for Ôba. Now the Takegami gang waits a chance to seize the Ginza territory.

The Private Police

1969

Merdeka 17805 poster
NR

True story of a number of Imperial Japanese Army officers and soldiers who remained in Indonesia to fight off European colonists trying to retake the country after Japan's surrender.

Merdeka 17805

2001

No artwork available
NR

The 1965 Japanese yakuza film is the last episode of the Ankokugai series.

Mission to Annihilate the Underworld

1965

Brothers Serving Time poster
8.0

While imprisoned, Tatsu encounters Danshi, a man who is a big honcho in the prison pecking order. After initial conflict they become sworn brothers. Tatsu and the sworn brothers he acquires weren’t really gangsters before their prison time, just ruffians. Prison, however, introduces them to plenty of gangland characters and three years later, they’re out of prison and enmeshed in the yakuza world.

Brothers Serving Time

1969

A Man Worth the Money poster
7.0

No synopsis available yet.

A Man Worth the Money

1966

Lips of Ruin poster
9.0

Industrial espionage in the pharmaceutical industry. Also known in English as “Black Parking Lot”.

Lips of Ruin

1963

The Great Villains poster
5.5

Psychological noir drama involving the tangled web of a disgraced yakuza, an innocent school girl, a blackmailed singer, and a corrupt lawyer.

The Great Villains

1968

The Last Loyalty Offering poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

The Last Loyalty Offering

1967

Parole poster
9.0

Three men vs. gangsters in a fight involving smuggled gold.

Parole

1967

King of the Gang poster
9.0

The 11th and final film in the Gang series. Most of the films had different directors and cast, and were only connected by the title and Toei's marketing department. Unlike the early entries, which were jazzy capers, this final entry is a prototype jitsuroku yakuza film. Just back from the war, Noboru Ando leads a gang of war vets turned gangster in the US occupied streets of Tokyo. They get into a conflict with a Chinese gang as well as the military police. Tetsuro Tamba appears as a police chief trying to bring peace to the streets; 1st wave pinky violence star Masumi Tachibana is a girl grieving his dead gangster father.

King of the Gang

1967

Yakuza Skirmishes poster
10.0

In the gaudy world of 1930s Shinjuku, a violent youth known as Bakudan Match tangles explosively with prostitutes, politicians and the police.

Yakuza Skirmishes

1972

Shibuya Story poster
9.0

Biopic of yakuza Noboru Ando, based on his autobiography.

Shibuya Story

2005

Kigeki: Ohi Kaenasutte! poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Kigeki: Ohi Kaenasutte!

1970

Two Enemy Women Gamblers poster
10.0

Twelfth film in the long-running series Daiei Studio's Woman Gambler with Kyoko Enami starring where she plays the woman gambler Ogin.

Two Enemy Women Gamblers

1969

喜劇 右向けェ左! poster
NR

Mamoru Hirayama, the sales manager of Clover Shoji, a women's underwear manufacturer, was selected by President Usui to be the manager of the foreign affairs section newly established in the sales department. Masaaki Sakata, Yasushi Inoda, Osamu Yamabe, and Jiro Oi were assigned to this foreign affairs section. Hirayama, a former soldier, is suddenly enthusiastic when the company orders him to join the Self-Defense Forces. One day, in the library where the records of the former army are displayed, Hirayama recalls his memories of that time. It turned out that the bundle of bills that the captain had made a mess of was packed in a box and buried somewhere.

喜劇 右向けェ左!

1970