Inquiry Concerning Japanese Remakes of American Films

[mark schilling]

There are many examples of Japanese remakes or remixes of Hollywood and
other foreign films at the pop end of the spectrum. One of the biggest box
office hits of the 1960s, Ishii Teruo's Abashiri Bangaichi (The Man From
Abashiri Jail, 1965) borrowed liberally from Stanley Kramer's The Defiant
Ones. Another Ishii film, Juichinin no Gang (Gang of Eleven, 1963) was
inspired by the Rat Pack vehicle Ocean's Eleven.

Nikkatsu Action derived much of its distinctive style from Hollywood and
European sources. Better known examples include Nomura Takashi Hayauchi Yaro
(Fast-Draw Guy), which was a remake of Anthony Mann's The Tin Star and
Masuda Toshio's Akai Hatoba (The Red Quay, 1958), which was inspired by Pepe
Le Moko. (And which Masuda remade in 1967, with borrowings from Godard's
Breathless, as Kurenai no Nagareboshi (The Velvet Hustler).)

More recently, Motohiro Katsuyuki's Koshonin (Negotiator) remixes many a
Hollywood movie, from Steven Spielberg's Duel and Clint Eastwood's The
Gauntlet to Alfred Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much. Also, its movie
geek villain bases his nefarious schemes from old Hollywood action films.

Much more to say, but little time!

Mark Schilling
schill at gol.com

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Michael McCaskey" <mccaskem at georgetown.edu>
To: <KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Friday, August 26, 2005 5:14 AM
Subject: Inquiry Concerning Japanese Remakes of American Films


> I will be giving a comparative lecture on American remakes of Japanese
films soon, and am writing it up now. I have quite a lot of information on
this subject, from the present and the past, but as a comparison I tried to
think of significant Japanese remakes of American films, and came up with
little.
>
> Kurosawa made films based on MacBeth and King Lear, and apparently his
Wonderful Sunday film was based on an unexpected old D.W. Griffith film
about people trying to manage in Germany at the end of World War I. He also
sort of remade The Lower Depths, but not from an American model. Most
people, however, focus on the well-known American and Italian films that
were close Western Action remakes of his samurai films.
>
> There are instances of Japanese film makers borrowing themes, subplots,
etc., from American and European movies at times. There are probably also
cases where makers of low-grade Japanese gangster films, etc., borrowed
liberally from US B- or C-gangster movies, etc.
>
> But can anyone help me out with one or two examples of actual notable
Japanese remakes of notable American films that I can cite for comparison in
my lecture?
>
> Thank you in advance for any light you can shed.
>
> Michael McCaskey
> Georgetown Univ.
>
>
>