I got into watching this film because of Shinichi Chiba. I’ve never seen any of the Truck Yaro films before, but since Sonny appears in the 5th instalment I thought it would be a good place to start. Wise decision, the series just found itself a new fan. I never thought I’d say this but now I’m ready and looking forward to seeing nine more films of Bunta Sugawara driving a truck...
No subtitled release of even a subscrip available, but that shouldn’t stop you from buying this wonderful comedy. The story itself is simple and told mostly through images, so it’s not hard to understand what’s going on. Beautiful landcapes, exciting chase sequences, pretty girls and cool soundtrack make it all the more enjoyable. There’s also lots of great physical comedy that needs no translation. I naturally missed the verbal jokes, but the great acting makes up quite a bit. I found myself laughing at jokes I can’t even understand. Bunta Sugawara was a real suprise to me. I’m used to seeing him in serious roles like Kinji Fukasaku’s Battles Without Honor and Humanity opus. Here he gives a wonderful comedy performance and still retains his charisma throughout the film. Chiba gives a nice ’tough guy with a comedic vibe’ performance, though I’ve seen him do that before in some of his other more humoristic action movies. It’s still as entertaining as ever.
Sugawara and Chiba make a very good pair as rivalry truck drivers. Bunta of course is our good-hearted but misbehaving hero, while Sonny plays a supporting role as the leader of the Jaws gang. Chiba’s tends to steal the show whenever he’s onscreen, however that doesn’t mean the movie would become any less enjoyable when he’s out of the picture. Nevertheless, I’d consider the bar fight between Chiba and Sugawara as the highlight of the movie. It is without a doubt one of the funniest fight scenes of the 70’s, something too funny to be explained. You have to see it yourself.
Worth a mention is also the scene where Bunta visits a bathhouse. Suddenly, he’s surrounded by a bunch nice young topless girls, and I almost thought Teruo Ishii had visited the set and taken over the directing duties. I only later learned that the film was actually directed by Norifumi Suzuki, which pretty much explains it all. Nice to see he hasn’t lost his touch even though we’re dealing with pure mainstream entertainment here. The segment finally reaches its peak with one of the most hilarious sex scenes I’ve seen.
I’m still quite stunned that I actually bought the film without even knowing it was directed by one of my favourite directors. I knew he had directed the first film and that he was the man behind the whole series but didn’t know he had directed all 10 instalments. I hope the quality remains as high in the other parts as it does here. Suzuki has history of being the kind of director who can make amazing films whenever he feels like it. But sometimes he can get a bit lazy. Here he obviously give the film all the attention it deserved. At the end of the film I had totally forgotten I’m watching a foreign language film without a subtitle tranlation. I was just enjoying the greatest feel-good film I’ve seen in quite some time. That, if something, is a sign of a quality film.
The dvd
The first thing I look at when I receive a Toei dvd is the blacks and the dark scenes. That’s the most likely thing to go wrong with their transfers. I wasn’t expecting too much since this in an older release, but luckily they’ve handled it very well. Dark scenes look quite good, and the colors are fantastic. Not too strong, not too weak, just right. There’s a few scenes that look a bit colourless but I’d assume that’s the way they’re supposed to look because they still look natural. I three or four instances of minor print damage, but they only last for a short time and are very minor indeed. While taking screencaptures I noticed that the first frame of the scene often has some wears, but that should be totally unnoticable when playing the film in normal speed. HK Video’s Sister Street Fighter (also a Toei film) dvd has the exact same ”problem”. Edge enhancement is almost non-existent as usual on Toei dvds. The audio is clean as well, there’s enough chapter stops, and the transfer looks progressive to me. Photo gallery and original trailer and teaser are included. Low priced limited editions (till March 31, 2007) are now available, so get these films now unless you want to pay 4500 yen instead of 3000 yen a piece.
Sugawara's truck
Kinya Aikawa
Shinichi Chiba
Chiba's truck. The other drivers in the gang drive Jaws II, Jaws III, Jaws IV and Jaws V
Example of the print damage that only lasts for one frame.
I know you all want a close up
A little bit of contast boosting perhaps? Minor enge enhancement to be seen as well. The EE never gets more noticable than this
Example of the "minor print damage" I was talking about. Lasts for several seconds.
