Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Final Episode
Your legacy is the blueprint for the future for those you take under your wing. Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Final Episode is the aptly-named final entry into the five-part Battles Without Honor and Humanity series of yakuza crime films, based on true events, about organized crime in Hiroshima, spanning a quarter of a century after the end of World War II. It is the resolution of the story of Shozo Hirono (Bunta Sugawara), a notorious yakuza caught up in this storm of violence, and of the epic vendettas and blood feuds of the families of gangsters that ran rampant through the city.
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If Final Episode feels a bit like an epilogue to the climactic events of its predecessor, Police Tactics, it may be in part because the previous film was originally intended to be the conclusion of the series, culminating in the highly publicized underworld war which rocked Western Japan during 1963, at the end of which Hirono was condemned to prison in Hokkaido for seven years. However, due to the overwhelming popularity of the films--full of intense action, complex plots, deception, and shifting alliances--Final Episode was adapted, and is an emblem of the legacy left behind by men like Hirono, as well as a denouement for the stoic underworld boss and how his perceptions of the world are forced to change in the face of the new generation. Although much of the previous films focused on the conflict between Hirono and his former boss, the backstabbing Yoshio Yamamori (Nobuo Kaneko), Final Episode concerns itself more with the framework hinted at toward the end of Police Tactics by Yamamori's former captain, Akira Takeda (Akira Kobayashi). A strategic genius, Takeda attempts to draw attention away from the families of Hiroshima by consolidating the yakuza into a "political coalition" known as Tensei. Takeda actively promotes this cleaner image by participating in events like the Hiroshima memorial march--ironic since the proverbial fallout from the black market that arose by necessity in the aftermath of World War II was the formative impetus behind the current organized crime structure in Hiroshima.
More than anyone else, Takeda sees the writing on the wall, and his strategy acknowledges this--that the days of yakuza acting on their aggression with impunity, seeking a never-ending spiral of retribution can no longer be tolerated publicly. Unfortunately, for all of his tact and cunning, there remain elements in the collective of gangsters for whom violence is in their blood, something which cannot be quelled by decree, and there are those looking to capitalize on that aspect. While Hirono is absent in prison, men from his gang are provoked by an allied family led by Hirono's friend, Terukichi Ichioka (Hiroki Matsukata), who believes that in order to prevent becoming ground down by their rivals, that they must strike back at Tensei. Following an assassination initiated by Ichioka of Tensei's financier, the response by Takeda and successor-elect, Tamotsu Matsumura (Kinya Kitaoji) is perceived as tepid, uncharacteristic of the implied yakuza code not far removed from "an eye for an eye". Further, it is taken as a sign of weakness by vice chairman, Katsutoshi Otomo (Joe Shishido), the very same hot-headed aggressor who was the primary antagonist of Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima. It would appear that nearly twenty years in prison had not quelled the rage within the vengeful yakuza, who begins to undermine Matsumura's control of Tensei following Takeda's incarceration. Essentially, Matsumura and Otomo are scions of the legacy left behind by men like Hirono and Takeda--two differences in ideology, representative of the divide between the wild dog gangsters and the business-minded suits of organized crime. Guys like Otomo are so bold, so convinced that their idea of what it means to be a yakuza is the right one, that it fills him with such rage that he doesn't even balk when he strides out of his headquarters, twin pistols openly displayed in his sash, literally gunning for a showdown. Matsumura, on the other hand, must navigate the treacherous waters of aged vendettas, allies of varying degrees of trustworthiness, and keeping the image of a political coalition as free of corruption, all while dissent from within and from without threatens to tear it all down.
Final Episode is a paradigm shift, not just for organized crime in Japan, but from one generation to the next, like the cultural transition from the 1960s and into the 1970s in the United States. Many of the street battles and assassinations are carried out under dubious pretenses, and that in many cases they are performed by the "children" of their family leaders in order to curry favor and praise, and in order to show their loyalty and dedication. Like it has always been with gangs, the clan is a substitute for an actual family, and its members are willing to make horrible sacrifices if they believe it will support their new infrastructure. One side story concerns a very young member of the Hirono family named Akio Saeki (Kenichi Sakuragi), who is barely a teenager, and who is willing to go so far to buy a gun for an assassination attempt on the perennial betrayer, Masakichi Makihara (Kunie Tanaka)--just released from prison himself--that he drugs his family with sleeping pills hidden in bottles of Coca-Cola in order to steal their savings. Akio's story isn't too different in some ways from Hirono's, who reached acclaim with Yamamori by assassinating a rival in a similar way--one all too familiar throughout the series. Hirono is the "father" of boys like Akio, and those boys look to their fathers for how they should live their lives. What is clear is that even while Hirono is "away" in prison, his family carries the message he has left behind, and they act out the tenets of his philosophy with the dedication of a real family. So while Hirono may be one of the more stoic and arguably more reasonable members of the crooked snakes in the dark underbelly of Hiroshima, he is still a part of the bigger picture, a cog in a machine which chews up young men and discards them, no matter their allegiance, under the auspices of "honor" and "family". During Hirono's stay in prison, he writes his memoirs--one could surmise they formed the basis of the Battles Without Honor and Humanity series. In his recollections, he closes by commenting that "when foolish men stand at the top, the men under them suffer and shed blood needlessly". This sentiment encapsulates Final Episode...and the series as a whole.
Recommended for: Fans of an epic conclusion to a series of intense and complex stories adapted from true events of the gangland violence in Hiroshima for a quarter of a decade. It is fascinating to watch this series of movies progress through this compelling time in history, and to see just how far an escalation of violence can radiate outwards, as well as how it affects those around it.
More than anyone else, Takeda sees the writing on the wall, and his strategy acknowledges this--that the days of yakuza acting on their aggression with impunity, seeking a never-ending spiral of retribution can no longer be tolerated publicly. Unfortunately, for all of his tact and cunning, there remain elements in the collective of gangsters for whom violence is in their blood, something which cannot be quelled by decree, and there are those looking to capitalize on that aspect. While Hirono is absent in prison, men from his gang are provoked by an allied family led by Hirono's friend, Terukichi Ichioka (Hiroki Matsukata), who believes that in order to prevent becoming ground down by their rivals, that they must strike back at Tensei. Following an assassination initiated by Ichioka of Tensei's financier, the response by Takeda and successor-elect, Tamotsu Matsumura (Kinya Kitaoji) is perceived as tepid, uncharacteristic of the implied yakuza code not far removed from "an eye for an eye". Further, it is taken as a sign of weakness by vice chairman, Katsutoshi Otomo (Joe Shishido), the very same hot-headed aggressor who was the primary antagonist of Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima. It would appear that nearly twenty years in prison had not quelled the rage within the vengeful yakuza, who begins to undermine Matsumura's control of Tensei following Takeda's incarceration. Essentially, Matsumura and Otomo are scions of the legacy left behind by men like Hirono and Takeda--two differences in ideology, representative of the divide between the wild dog gangsters and the business-minded suits of organized crime. Guys like Otomo are so bold, so convinced that their idea of what it means to be a yakuza is the right one, that it fills him with such rage that he doesn't even balk when he strides out of his headquarters, twin pistols openly displayed in his sash, literally gunning for a showdown. Matsumura, on the other hand, must navigate the treacherous waters of aged vendettas, allies of varying degrees of trustworthiness, and keeping the image of a political coalition as free of corruption, all while dissent from within and from without threatens to tear it all down.
Final Episode is a paradigm shift, not just for organized crime in Japan, but from one generation to the next, like the cultural transition from the 1960s and into the 1970s in the United States. Many of the street battles and assassinations are carried out under dubious pretenses, and that in many cases they are performed by the "children" of their family leaders in order to curry favor and praise, and in order to show their loyalty and dedication. Like it has always been with gangs, the clan is a substitute for an actual family, and its members are willing to make horrible sacrifices if they believe it will support their new infrastructure. One side story concerns a very young member of the Hirono family named Akio Saeki (Kenichi Sakuragi), who is barely a teenager, and who is willing to go so far to buy a gun for an assassination attempt on the perennial betrayer, Masakichi Makihara (Kunie Tanaka)--just released from prison himself--that he drugs his family with sleeping pills hidden in bottles of Coca-Cola in order to steal their savings. Akio's story isn't too different in some ways from Hirono's, who reached acclaim with Yamamori by assassinating a rival in a similar way--one all too familiar throughout the series. Hirono is the "father" of boys like Akio, and those boys look to their fathers for how they should live their lives. What is clear is that even while Hirono is "away" in prison, his family carries the message he has left behind, and they act out the tenets of his philosophy with the dedication of a real family. So while Hirono may be one of the more stoic and arguably more reasonable members of the crooked snakes in the dark underbelly of Hiroshima, he is still a part of the bigger picture, a cog in a machine which chews up young men and discards them, no matter their allegiance, under the auspices of "honor" and "family". During Hirono's stay in prison, he writes his memoirs--one could surmise they formed the basis of the Battles Without Honor and Humanity series. In his recollections, he closes by commenting that "when foolish men stand at the top, the men under them suffer and shed blood needlessly". This sentiment encapsulates Final Episode...and the series as a whole.
Recommended for: Fans of an epic conclusion to a series of intense and complex stories adapted from true events of the gangland violence in Hiroshima for a quarter of a decade. It is fascinating to watch this series of movies progress through this compelling time in history, and to see just how far an escalation of violence can radiate outwards, as well as how it affects those around it.