Japanese crime dram from Toho and director Senkichi Taniguchi. A trio of bank robbers (Takashi Shimura, Toshiro Mifune, and Yoshio Kosugi) hideout in an isolated snow mountain resort town. After a close call with the cops, they end up in small hunting lodge run by mountaineer Honda (Akitake Kono), young girl Haruko (Setsuko Wakayama), and her grandfather (Kokuten Kodo). In such close quarters, the robbers nerves begin to fray, as the snow piles up higher outside and the police close in. Also featuring Fusataro Ishijima, Fumio Omachi, Taizo Fukami, and Eizaburo Sakauchi.
Featuring a screenplay by Akira Kurosawa, this frigidly atmospheric crime picture is also notable for being the film debut of Japanese screen legend Toshiro Mifune. He plays a violent hothead, a character type he'd return to several times over the next decade or more. He's very charismatic here, lean and intimidating. Takashi Shimura turns in yet another fine, understated performance. The snow-capped mountain scenery offers some fantastic location cinematography, and the mountain climbing scenes are suspenseful. Mifune and Shimura would re-team the next year in Drunken Angel, directed by Akira Kurosawa, and it would mark a turning point in all three careers and begin decades of fruitful collaboration.
Featuring a screenplay by Akira Kurosawa, this frigidly atmospheric crime picture is also notable for being the film debut of Japanese screen legend Toshiro Mifune. He plays a violent hothead, a character type he'd return to several times over the next decade or more. He's very charismatic here, lean and intimidating. Takashi Shimura turns in yet another fine, understated performance. The snow-capped mountain scenery offers some fantastic location cinematography, and the mountain climbing scenes are suspenseful. Mifune and Shimura would re-team the next year in Drunken Angel, directed by Akira Kurosawa, and it would mark a turning point in all three careers and begin decades of fruitful collaboration.