The Cat Gambler Series
Year: 1965 - 1966
Director: Hiroshi
Noguchi
Gambling Kitten
(1965) - 7.0
AKA The Cat Girl Gambler aka Toba no mesunekai
This was the first in a series of three
films from Nikkatsu about a female gambler who is a master dice roller in
the game of Cho-han. In all three films she is played by Yumiko Nogawa who
has had a very lengthy acting career appearing in three Seijun Suzuki films
including Gate of Flesh and Story of a Prostitute. All three films are directed
by Hiroshi Noguchi in lovely black and white. There were at least two other
film series of female gamblers at the time that were quite popular - the
eight Red Peony Gambler films starring Junko Fuji and the seventeen Woman
Gambler series starring Enami Kyoko. Since this only went for three films
I would guess it was not a smash. During this period, Japanese film companies
rode a winner till it died from exhaustion.
The films throw you right into the world
of the Yakuza (originated from the numbers 8.9,3 that spell out Ya-ku-za
- a losing hand in cards). Though our heroine Yukiko (Yumiko) dresses almost
always in a traditional kimono the films are set in contemporary times when
the films were made. In particular, the films put you into the Yakuza gambling
world of small illegal dens strewn around the city run by various gangs -
where the game of Cho-han is played. A croupier sternly throws two dice into
a wooden cup and places it face down like a slap on the floor. The men kneeling
around the playing area bet on whether the dice will tally to an even or
an odd number. Simple one would think but this is the Yakuza and the odds
are with the house if the croupier is talented with the dice or able to substitute
fixed dice with a quick slight of hand. Of course, if you are caught there
are repercussions - such as in the first scene when a cheater has a knife
driven through his hand - all part of the code which he accepts.
Yukiko's father was such a cheat who thought
he had made an undetectable pair of fake dice - but his reward is a fatal
head first dive into the river. The cops have not been able to find his killer
after a year and so Yukiko decides to look for the killer herself. How? Well
obviously by spending hours practicing the throwing of dice till she masters
them. Then she begins working for the Yakuza where Ito (Hideaki Nitani) takes
her under his wing, teaches her a few tricks and tattoos her body in various
areas to distract the men players. He clearly has a deft touch as a tattoo
artist as she writhes and groans with something very close to an orgasm.
Now she can look for her father's killer in style.
Though Yakuza focused, the film doesn't
really portray them in a wholly negative way - certain members yes - but
not the life style - and the casual manner in which the cops interact with
them makes it almost like they are a boy's club gone bad. Other than a few
tussles there isn't much violence as it is more of a drama than a crime film
with some enjoyable gambling scenes. Yumiko Nogawa is terrific - a sensual
demur smile with slightly crooked teeth and pleading eyes go a long ways
here.
Woman Gambler (1965) - 6.5
AKA - Cat Girl's Gamblers - Naked Flesh
Paid into the Pot aka Toba no mesuniko: suhada no tsubo furi.
This is the second film in the Nikkatsu
Cat Girl Gambler series - and again stars Yumiko Nogawa and is directed by
Hiroshi Noguchi. It helps a bit to have a scorecard in this one as there
are a lot of characters and a few different Yakuza gangs to keep straight.
Our girl Yukiko (Yumiko) appears to have given up her trade as a croupier
in the game of Cho-han to become a masseuse where most of her clientele are
gangsters who need the kinks worked out.
But in fact, she is once again looking
for a murderer that the same cops as in the previous film are also looking
for. Since the last film Yukiko has discovered that her mother who deserted
the family when Yukiko was a baby remarried and had a daughter - a half sister
for Yukiko - now the only family she has. The man though who married her
mother was the head of a Yakuza clan, the Tempu, and when he is murdered
the sister is under pressure from two other clans to give up territory. Yukiko
of course jumps in to help by finding out who the killer is.
This gets complicated when a yakuza on
the run from two other gangsters comes through her window. And he turns out
to be a dead ringer for Ito, the man who helped her in the last film. But
it is not Ito but Seiji (not surprisingly played by Hideaki Nitani) who just
got out of prison and was a protector of the Tempu clan. What a small world
it is. Eventually though to find the killer Yukiko has to pick up the cup
and the pair of dice and apply her trade to get the inside scoop.
The film has a great opening scene in which
Yukiko is throwing the dice and is accused of cheating with a pair of fake
dice. She haughtily rises to her feet and challenges the man to search her
- I will make it easy for you - as she drops her kimono and anything else
under there - sits down and spreads her legs for him to search - all seen
from the back or the head up where this is all only implied. It is only 1965,
a few years still before that might have been a frontal camera shot.
Cat Girl Gamblers: Abandoned Fangs of Triumph
(1966) - 6.5
AKA - The Revenge of the Woman Gambler
aka Toba no mesuneko: sutemi no shôbu
This is the third and final film in the
Cat Girl Gambler series starring Yumiko Nogawa as a Master Dice thrower in
the game of Cho-han. At the end of the second film they stole a page out
of the Zatoichi films with her leaving town and wandering alone down an empty
dirt road to a new fate. Of course, since these films were set in the 1960's
it was a bit odd to be walking to the next town and sure enough at the beginning
of the third film she is on a train taking her father's ashes - killed in
the first film - back home to be buried. But as always the Yakuza life follows
her. As does her bad luck in love. Lucky in dice, broken-hearted in love
as the saying could go. Once you are stained with the mark of the Yakuza
- literally in her case with tattoos across her back and on her thigh - a
normal life is out of reach.
She meets up with an old friend of her
father's who heads a Yakuza clan named the Gunji. They are a bit down on
their luck and only have a motheaten cabaret club where five Japanese girls
in blonde wigs strip each night to the salivating applause of the men in
the audience. Yukiko (Yumiko) is given the job of running it and fending
off the advances of another Yakuza gang, the Maisaka's who want the club
and to run the Gunji out of town. A USA military base is coming to town and
they see the potential of the club. In this rendering of the Yakuza the Gunji
are like Boy Scouts while the Maisaka's are predators. This yin and yang
depiction of the Yakuza runs through all these films. They are not all bad
and follow certain honorable codes.
Among Maisaka's men is Yamaguchi, sort
of a free agent/free spirit type in sunglasses who enjoys playing with guns
who takes a liking to Yukiko and surreptitiously helps her on occasion -
and he wants her to roll the dice for Maisaka. He is played by Jo Shishido
- famous to Western audiences for his appearances in Seijun Suzuki films
in particular Branded to Kill in 1967 - but he was already a big star for
Nikkatsu by the time of this film with his artificially augmented Chipmonk
cheeks that he had done in the 1950's to bolster his career.
This film has some excellent scenes and
more action than the previous two films - at one point Yukiko has to take
over the leadership of the Gunji clan and there is a ceremony to mark this
in which she does a sword dance. Still by the standards of Yakuza films that
were soon to come these are fairly tame with no gushing blood or large scale
fights - but gave the audience a mix of drama and melodrama in the world
of the Yakuza with Yumiko Nogawa being the main reason to watch them. In
the end she again has to move on to another town, another broken-heart. But
sadly we never get to see them.