Am beginning this on August 22nd but will be taking my time finishing it. Bet if I really wanted to could have had this post done on that date but have a strong feeling I would have wanted to do a fifth post this month for this series which would have been a record. Which I didn't feel like setting as August has been a better month as far as doing posts for my favorite women goes and would rather concentrate on those posts. Not sure what this post will contain as far as mini reviews go, know what the American TV series will be and also the first two movies but what else? For I don't review every movie I watch, there's two others I've viewed the past week but think I'll skip those. Have been slacking on talking about Japanese movies and what I'm thinking is to end the post off with a pair of movies from a five film series, they came out in 1970/71. I've been trying to just have reviews for dramas and movies I've never seen but those two are ones I've seen about ten times each but not for two years. I'm missing doing rewatches of my favorites and should start doing more of them as those older movies are ones I bought on DVD many years ago. Bet I have over a thousand Japanese movies on DVD so you can imagine the vast amount of money I've spent on them and it doesn't make sense letting them collect dust.
EDIT: Have now finished writing the reviews up and things remained the same as this post contains one TV series review and three movies. The final one is from Japan and I'm going to have many more of them coming up, perhaps will devote a post to films from that country. Did that often when I re-started this series last September but then got out of doing that to review movies from other countries. Which was a positive and films from Germany are quickly becoming favorites of mine, have a review below for a 1958 movie and also a terrific American Noir film from 1954.
One other AWOL woman is one who was extremely popular with you viewers is Hinako Sano, she was close to being the number one gravure model with you readers! But Hinako hasn't done any modeling for three years, in October she'll be celebrating her 32nd birthday so guess modeling will a thing of the past. Hinako hasn't gotten married and is still very eligible, of all things back in June passed the difficult test of becoming a pro Mahjong player(!) so perhaps her and Kana Nakada can team up for a photobook!!!! Her career just began so don't have any stats or news to pass along but it isn't easy in Japan to become a Mahjong pro and to join a league so that's what Hinako had been up to for a while so will be keeping tabs on her. Besides Kana also huge fanatics of the game/sport are Akari, Nashiko and Haruna from Morning Musume plus I bet a few others that have posts here are also big fans of the game, think a series of books dedicated to those players would be a terrific idea!
On to the reviews, have been doing one American series and three movies but unsure if there will be a fourth for today. Decided on a new show or at least for here as I had viewed the first two seasons at the end of 2024, had planned in taking just a month or so break from it which turned into twenty! I don't know much about the brothers Grimm whose first names were Jacob and Wilhelm who were German and became noted for their stories that were released in the first half of the 1800's. Both were scholars but turned their attention to writing horror tales and many of them became very popular back then and have remained so until today. Some of their more known tales/stories were "Little Red Riding Hood" plus "Hansel and Gretel", "The Frog Prince" and many more. The stories weren't written as children's tales but many turned out that way even though most tales were kind of creepy and eerie. There's plenty out there if you want to learn more about the Grimm brothers and this was just a short intro for today's TV series.
Which has the title of "Grimm" that ran for six seasons from 2011-17 and had 123 episodes. This was the series I said above had only planned on taking a month break from and had forgotten all about the series after that month. So needed to start from episode one as I had forgotten most of what took place and glad I did do that for the show is better than I had remembered. The GRIMM in this show is about a police detective in Portland, Oregon who is a human and has the powers of a Grimm which is in his family's bloodlines. Over the centuries a Grimm is a person who battles odd creatures and many of them are from the original stories, a Grimm can see these creatures/monsters for what they really are while no other human can do that. David Giuntoli played the character of detective Nick Burkhardt and he has that ability to see a monster and all have the form of a human yet can transform into a dangerous creature. Most of these monsters who are known as Wesen aren't violent and try to lead a peaceful life but there are so many others who are the opposite and it's hard to believe how many of these creatures there are that roam our streets! Many references in this series are from the original stories so many words/sayings are German ones and I would need a few posts to describe all of the monsters who have hard to pronounce names.
One person who does know about Nick's hidden powers is the man on the left above who has a beard. His name is Monroe played by Silas Weir Mitchell, he knew Nick was a Grimm from the first second they met for Monroe can detect if a human is also a Grimm. That's because Monroe is a Wesen monster and there's hundreds of different species, he's a Blutbad and that's a monster very similar to a werewolf. Monroe hates being such a creature and for the most part never transforms over to being a wolf unless to save his or someone else's life, that transformation is called Woge. There's many other humans like Monroe that are also Wesen but try to live normal lives and until Nick became a Grimm most Wesen had never seen one in real life. Monroe and Nick have become good friends, Monroe has proven to be invaluable to Nick as he knows so much about Wesens and has helped him solve many cases. Monroe can speak German fluently and though he's in his early forties he could be over a hundred years old and a question not answered yet is how long does a Wesen live and often human weapons such as guns have no affect on these creatures. Towards the end of the first season Monroe has met a woman Wesen named Bree who is operating her brother's potion shop after he was murdered. Monroe fell so fast for this woman who will be a main character starting in season two.
You need a scorecard to keep track of all the Wesen species, it's hard to remember their names for all are in German and don't roll off the tongue easy. But I enjoy seeing German used in a TV series which is very rare, I took the language for four years in high school and it's not common here in the states so I was getting quite rusty. It's nice to be refreshed on some words and phrases but the names for the Wesen creatures are ones I never learned and perhaps many were just created for this show? Such as a Blutbad and said that was similar to a Werewolf, then there's a Fuchsbau which looks like a Fox and that's what Bree can turn into. The blonde evil woman Adalind Schade is a Hexenbiest which is a Witch and what a cruel creature she is. An Eisbiber is very similar to a Beaver, they're very meek and never cause problems nor are dangerous. One other type of Wesen is a Zauberbiest who is close to being a Warlock and are quite powerful but aren't always aggressive or violent. Those are rare creatures but there is one in Portland and it just happens to be Nick's chief at the police station, his name is Captain Sean Renard who is played by Sasha Roiz. The Captain is aware that Nick is a Grimm but for some reason Nick's ability to expose a Wesen doesn't work on Renard and he's actually been a supporter of Nick. I like the Renard character and he's a descendant from a German royal family, Renard is someone who is out for justice and unknown to Nick has killed many foreign Wesen monsters as Portland seems to be a magnet for them.
Last bit and the character I like the most is in the bottom two pictures. Reggie Lee plays sergeant Drew Wu and the second to last pic showed him on the verge of death for eating a laced cookie! Wu is highly efficient and is always in the middle of a case even though he's not a detective. What makes Wu so special is that he's full of ironic and sarcastic comments which at times lighten up the mood for there's so many deaths in each episode and almost all are committed by a Wesen or a pack of them. So that's a quickie overview for this series which kept getting better with each passing episode, the first five seasons all had 22 of them. There was an unexpected cliffhanger to end the first season off as Nick's life was saved by his mother Keely Kessler-Burkhardt, what made it unexpected was that she was presumed to have died in an auto accident eighteen years prior.... or was her husband murdered and Kelly escaped? If so was a Japanese assassin named Akira Kimura involved in that incident(?) and he's the one who had tried killing Nick at the end of this first season. Kimura was looking for three magical yet evil coins which he thought Nick had though he couldn't find them. Nick does have them and they're hidden at his deceased aunt Marie's trailer, with such a cliffhanger should I put my next series on hold for a few days and dive into season two early to satisfy my curiosity? EDIT: No and tonight will wrap up season ten of "Gunsmoke". After the photos is a four minute trailer video for this first season, you can see how action packed it is and there's other videos from this season worth checking out.
There were many highlights to the first season of "Grimm" but my biggest one was who guest starred in episode eleven. Above is from that episode and within a micro second thought to myself is that Amy Acker(?) and couldn't quite tell from the angle her head was at. But a few seconds later Amy did reveal her radiant face and needless to say I was quite overjoyed for I had completely forgotten she had made a guest appearance. Amy is one of my all time mega favorites and is one of only four to get a rating of a 10/10 from me, talked about her often in the reviews for the "Person of Interest" series. Amy joined that cast a few weeks after appearing in this eleventh episode and she's hard to recognize in a few of the pics from this show because of transforming into a Monster!
She played a Wesen named Lena Marcinko who was a Spinnetod or a creature very similar to a Black Widow. Lena was so darn attractive and every five years a Spinnetod has to kill three people to stop aging, Lena looked to be 26 in age but was decades older. Lena had killed two but was thwarted on the attempt to kill the third and that may mean the end of her life. Nick had stopped Lena from killing her final human and arrested her, as the episode ended we saw Lena sitting in a cell aging rapidly and it appeared she only had a few minutes to live! Below are some pictures from this episode and Amy was trying to find out if blondes have more fun! After the photos is a video from this episode and scroll to the 1:28 mark for Lena.
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Horror movies are my favorites but had been viewing too many of them and needed a change, Noir is also a genre I love and especially the movies from the 1950's. There are so many from that decade and it'd take well over a year to view them all, here's one in that genre from January 1954 which I had never heard of yet was so terrific. Besides the stories being so compelling most of the Noir films from the 50's are only 75-90 minutes in length so you can view two in one sitting, this one was 74 minutes long which meant I could view another in the same night and that's the next movie. Though I haven't seen nearly as many American films compared to ones from Japan do have some actors and movie series I like quite a bit. One actor is Charles Bronson and those first four "Death Wish" movies are must watches! His real last name was Buchinsky and used that name his first few years in Hollywood, he used that name in this movie. Charles played the tough guy Ben Hastings in this movie, he didn't become a star for another seven or so years and he was 32 in age when this movie "Crime Wave" was filmed. Charles did so many guest appearances in Westerns, saw him on one "Gunsmoke" episode but he was in five "Have Gun, Will Travel" episodes. When I began this 'My Current Watches' series could do a mini review in three paragraphs and in a way still can. But I've gotten into the habit of having an intro paragraph for the movies and though it makes the review longer to me it could be the best part of the review as added in are many trivial and oddball facts along with the bio of stars and also many photos, above are lobby cards and I really like those. This intro was long enough and now on to the hopefully fast paced review of "Crime Wave" that was released on January 12, 1954 and was 74 minutes in length. The main star was Sterling Hayden who played Detective/Lieutenant Sims, no first name was ever used. He was a very known actor yet was never a superstar, at 77 inches in height he was a tall man.
This Noir film opened up with a car pulling into a station and gas back then cost about twenty cents a gallon! Out hopped a trio of men, a pair looked very shady and the attendant only noticed two of the convicts who two days earlier had escaped from San Quentin! So they did their traveling at night and of course always needed money, they pistol whipped the attendant Snider and robbed the safe which had $130 which in the 1950's was a decent amount of cash. Two of the goons robbed the safe, Ben Hastings who I mentioned above and the trio's leader 'Doc' Penny, he was also the oldest of the small gang. While the pair were robbing the safe outside the office the third man 'Gat' Morgan was filling up the gas tank, not knowing who this man was in pulled a motorcycle patrolman to see what was going on. He noticed many bullets in the glove compartment, when the patrolman pulled out his revolver he was shot by Morgan, in turn the office shot Morgan. Out dashed the pair from the office, Hastings shot the officer again and this time the bullet ended his life. With it being a crowded neighborhood the cops would be swarming there any minute, Penny gave Morgan some money to get the bullet removed. Morgan left on his own while Penny and Hastings robbed a car, soon the area was teeming with the police! Morgan headed to the apartment of an old acquaintance from San Quentin, his name was Steve Lacey and had been released two years prior. Lacey is in the fourth screenshot below and he'll be in many of them, his wife's name is Ellen. In the two years since leaving prison Lacey has turned his life around, he works as an airline mechanic and his life seemed to be going well.... until the shot Morgan knocked at his door!
Better get moving with the story as I need to finish in two paragraphs! Think Lacey had a clue his old cronies from San Quentin would make an arrival because of their escape, the other two will get there soon enough. Morgan stumbled into Lacey's tiny apartment and his wife Ellen wanted the con gone immediately but that wasn't possible. Before arriving Morgan had contacted another mate from prison whose name was Otto Hessler, he was a veterinarian but also had studied regular medicine, it was Hessler who would remove the bullet. But by the time he arrived Morgan was dead, the vet/doctor took the money Penny had given his partner Morgan and fled from the dumbfounded Lacey's apartment! Later on Hessler would be killed by Hastings who murdered two and it easily could have been four men. While that was going on down at the LAPD it was all hands on deck for a fellow officer had been killed and it was kind of neat watching how the police set up such a raid and an APB over seventy years ago. Leading the team would be Detective/Lieutenant Sims, he's the tall man in many screenshots below. He had been keeping track of the route Penny, Morgan and Hastings had taken since escaping from San Quentin, they've pulled off many small time robberies such as the gas station job as not to draw too much attention to themselves. But that luck ended in LA, Sims wisely predicted the trio would contact their old mate Lacey so he was about to be paid a visit. Lacey had hidden Morgan's body for the time being, he then called his parole officer O'Keefe who rushed right over to Lacey's pad. Already there was Sims and his crew but they couldn't break Lacey for he hadn't committed a crime. O'Keefe was an ally of Lacey's and did all he could to keep him from being jailed by Sims but that didn't work but in a way we didn't realize Sims had a plan which did pan out. On the outside Sims told his team Once a con, Always a con when it came to a person such as Steve Lacey. However he had become a decent fellow since his prison release, Sims thought if he could make Lacey mad at him it may sway him to join forces with Penny and Hastings when they came a'knockin which happened two days later after Steve was released.
Need to squeeze everything into this one last paragraph, though Lacey has become a decent man think when Penny explained his plans for a robbery it made Lacey recall the excitement of older days. Penny's plan was to rob an LA bank at noon on a Saturday, it would be so unexpected and security is light on that day. Lacey would drive the getaway car and would wait outside the bank, Lacey was a master at eluding the police in a chase. Lacey will wait outside the bank while Penny and Hastings do the actual robbery. There will be one other helping out on the heist who is Penny's old gang mate Sully, he'll cut the alarms at exactly 12:05 pm and the robbery will take place right then. While that's going on Lacey's wife Ellen will be at Sully's hideout and will be guarded by a thug named Oscar, Lacey was forced to go along with the heist lest he wanted to see something happen to his wife. At first I didn't think he was all that bright but the detective Sims was, he had been trying to figure out where Penny and his gang would make a major heist as the money from small robberies wasn't lasting long enough. He put together all of the facts, details and possibilities on where Penny would strike, Sims correctly deduced the bank. Him and his force arrived just in time as the robbery was going on, Penny and Hastings were shot while Sully was taken into custody. Lacey did escape and it took the LAPD a while to catch up with him, being an ex-con driving a getaway car for a heist may mean twenty more years for Lacey! But this is when we discovered the plans of Sims which were of Lacey to get close to Penny and his goons, Sims did believe Lacey had changed his criminal ways and that was shocking news to Lacey. Even more shocking was when Sims said to Lacey and Ellen they were free to go and to keep living their now decent life, that's in the bottom screenshot and that was the end of this suspenseful movie. This film had it all..... robberies, murders, suspense, intrigue and that gloomy atmosphere which is so essential for Noir movies. I highly recommend this 1954 movie but I am biased as these oldies are my favorites and does anyone try out my recommendations?! After the screenshots is a trailer for the movie which is narrated by Sterling Hayden who played the semi-hero detective Sims.
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Up until five weeks ago had never seen a German film, this now makes it four I've viewed in that time span and have two more on deck! This is actually a German/Swiss joint venture, the cast were mainly German actors but the movie was set in Switzerland and the filming was done there. Mainly in the region of Zurich and Chur though we didn't see much of either city, this film was based upon a novel by the Swiss writer Friedrich Durrenmatt and above are some fairly cool lobby cards for this film. Let me try to zip through this and make it only a three paragraph review and have gotten away from that. The final pic above is how the movie ended, the man is Heinz Ruhmann who was a popular German actor and he played the lead role of Lieutenant Matthai, he was very respected at the Zurich police station yet when the film began Matthai was about to leave his home country and travel to Jordan for five years to train their police forces! That's an abrupt life change but Matthai's departure was put on hold for there was a killing along the quiet highway linking Zurich and Chur, the victim was a young girl about eight in age. By some investigating Matthai's potential replacement Heinzi had found out there had been two other young girls slain along this highway in the past five years and to Heinzi it appeared the killer would strike much sooner for his fourth killing which Matthai agreed with and so didn't the Zurich police chief Gretler. But first the third killing must be solved of this eight year old girl named Heidi and the list of suspects only had one person! Who is the man in the first screenshot below, his name was Jacquier and he's the person who had found Heidi's body. Jacquier was a peddler and while looking for goods in the forest he discovered the body of the young girl. The peddler rushed to a nearby restaurant and called the inspector Matthai who he trusted, Jacquier was not well liked by the villagers. After talking with the man Matthai was confident Jacquier wasn't the killer but Matthai's successor Heinzi didn't share that opinion, Jacquier was arrested and given the third degree at the station! **** As usual forgot to add in the movie's title which is "It Happened in Broad Daylight" and the release date was July 9, 1958.
But the down and out peddler never broke for he was innocent and this was taking place the day before Matthai was supposed to take his five year trip to Jordan. He didn't agree with the way Jacquier was being treated but it was no longer his case, that evening there was a farewell party for the inspector. Before that Matthai and Heinzi had visited the school of the murdered Heidi and no students had any info to give them though one girl said Heidi talked of being visited by a giant. Which was close to the truth as discovered in the classroom wall was a drawing Heidi did and to Matthai it appeared she had drawn her killer! That drawing is below and to all small children a tallish man will look like a giant but the police still had no leads. The following morning Matthei boarded his plane to the Mideast but was only onboard for two minutes as something ignited a spark in the inspector's mind! The man sitting next to Matthei had opened a bag of chocolate truffles and they looked eerily similar to the object the giant was holding in Heidi's drawing. Matthai dashed from the plane and headed straight to the Zurich PD to say Jacquier was innocent but arrived too late! For very early in the morning Jacquier had hung himself and that did unnerve Matthai for this innocent man did not deserve to die. Matthai wanted back on the case but his chief Gretler denied the request for he was no longer a member of the police force. So Matthai undertook his own investigation and had deduced the killer was moving slowly down a highway from Zurich to Chur looking for young girls/victims 7-10 in age but how to catch such a fiend? Matthai's plan was something of a whim, when he stopped for gas at a station just before Chur the owner said he wanted to take a trip back to his homeland of Italy. Matthai agreed to rent the station for three months and that way he could keep tabs on the drivers and any young girls in the area, it was a long shot but in the end the killer was nabbed.
Final paragraph and Matthai had to look suspicious at first as he would scout out schools for girls 7-10 in age who resembled Heidi and the other two victims. To make his difficult search somewhat easier Matthai hired a housekeeper/cook but the bigger reason for bringing Frau Heller in was because of her daughter Annemarie who was seven in age and looked so much like the murdered Heidi. Before Matthai had left Zurich he paid a visit to a friend who was a psychiatrist named Otto and he gave many tips on how to find such a killer so this was also one of the first films that used Profiling to nab a criminal. The doctor said the child killer would be middle aged and a bit meek except around children and had a wife who treated him harshly. It turned out Otto hit a bullseye with his assessment and Matthai did notice a man fitting that description stopping at his station. This man's name was Schrott and as it turned out he had noticed Annemarie playing along the highway, that was a plan of Matthai's though his using the child as a 'bait' was a bit dangerous. Schrott would give these girls gifts and perform magic tricks, if they told an adult then those fun times would cease. But luckily Annemarie told Matthei about this man and it was good timing as Schrott was about to make his move as Annemarie would soon have been his fourth victim! But Matthei was a step ahead, he called his old chief Gretler at the Zurich PD who set a trap for Schrott in the forest where he had planned on killing Annemarie. Schrott would kill the girls with a razor, he used that against Matthei in an effort to escape but was shot by the police though did live and hate to say it was a happy ending but there was no fourth girl killed. There was very little action in this movie yet it was highly suspenseful and interesting the entire way through. At first Matthai didn't seem to be a likable character for he was so stern but we did end up rooting for him and truly cared about saving the lives of Annemarie and any potential future victims. This wasn't a Noir film like the above one but was very similar, it's only the fourth German movie I've viewed but they seem to put out high quality police/mystery thrillers so if you're a fan of that genre would recommend this film. Below are plenty of screenshots from the action, when they're subbed it makes following the story easier and below is also a trailer for the movie. Of course some things had to be left out of this 99 minute movie and that was to keep the review shortish but didn't omit any key details.
Viewed two Japanese films back to back but am only going to review the first however will talk a bit about the series it's from. Which is the five part movie series "Stray Cat Rock", four films came out in 1970 and the final the following year. This series helped make Meiko Kaji such a star and she's my all time #1 actress and perhaps woman(!), she was 23 in age for these films and still acts these days in dramas. I'll admit this may not be the best movie series of all time but it's my favorite, films 2-5 I've watched a dozen times each. But the first "Stray Cat Rock" movie I've seen a hundred times(!), that too is not my favorite film nor would it be in my top ten yet it's the most enjoyable and entertaining one I've ever seen. Meiko was the only actress to be in all five films, the one male actor who appeared in all five was Tatsuya Fuji and he too had a very successful career, many others appeared in 2-3 of the films and for each one the character an actor portrayed was different. This series was kind of rebellious and it showed the struggles of young adults in Japan, in a way they were kind of 'anti establishment' movies though it didn't send a message to riot, protest or be violent. So you may have to view them to understand what I mean and these five films are easy enough to get, above is a box set of the series though I bought my DVD's one at a time.
If it wasn't for the successful careers of Meiko and Tatsuya this series could have gone on for a while longer but perhaps the quality would have gone down a bit with time. For instance Yasuharu Hasabe directed the first four films which I highly recommend viewing, he didn't do the fifth movie which was still a decent watch but didn't quite match up to the first four, the title of that was "Stray Cat Rock: Beat '71". The movie I'll be reviewing after the below screenshots is the final 1970 movie and the fourth one of the series, "Stray Cat Rock: Machine Animal". My favorite is the first followed by the second "Wild Jumbo", this would be my third fave followed by the third "Sex Hunter" and the final film would be fifth but is still worth a view. Least if you're a Meiko fan it is though her role was much smaller in that final movie, there are some articles out there about the five movie series and they're worth reading. One note about this fourth film is that it's the only one where Meiko's character didn't get killed at the end, one common trend is that all the films end on a sad and kind of depressing note as none of the main characters are winners at the end. These movies also have some terrific and obscure music as you can see below, most of the tunes in the five films were of a Psychedelic nature but all were cool and go-go dancing was still the rage in Japan though it had died out by then in most of the world. Will begin the regular review for "Stray Cat Rock: Machine Animal" right after these screenshots, the movie was 82 minutes in length and it was released on November 22, 1970. All five films were between 82-87 minutes which is a perfect length to me, it leaves no time for any filler and the action zooms right by plus you can watch two of them in a night which is what I did.
Every movie had different characters though the two main leads of Meiko and Tatsuya were in each movie. The stories were also different and this one dealt with an American soldier who went AWOL from Vietnam and was hoping to make his way to Sweden. This GI was named Charlie and was actually played by a Japanese actor so we didn't hear him speak too much. Somehow Charlie hooked up with two young Japanese men who will help him get to Sweden for those men also wanted to leave the country. The pair are in many screenshots, in the second one below on the right is Nobo(Tatsuya) and Sabu(Jiro Okazaki) and their scheme to raise the million yen needed to leave on a ship was to sell 500 capsules of LSD! But their get-rich-quick plan didn't work out so well, first off they had a run in with Maya's(Meiko) gang who heard about the pills and wanted them for themselves! Maya and Nobo didn't hit it off well but as time went on she softened her views about him, Sabu and Charlie, once she heard about their plan to leave Japan she bent over backwards to help them. For three times the LSD pills were stolen, once by a member of her own gang, once by a bartender at their local rock club and the other by the man below in the first screenshot with the stick, also the bottom one above. His name was Sakura(Eiji Go..... brother of Jo Shishido!) and all presumed he was the head of the Dragon gang. He stole the pills when they raided the temporary lair of Nobo and the others which is when everyone learned the real leader of the gang was the woman in a wheelchair below. Her name was Yuri(Bunjaku Han) and she was in the chair due to being injured by Sakura's motorcycle two years prior and he's doing everything in his powers to atone for his tragic mistake.
Will have a first which is of a review being done in two paragraphs! Learning that the disabled Yuri was the leader of the Dragons gave Maya's group such an advantage as they kidnapped her after Sakura had stolen the drugs which would be the last time it happened. Nobo demanded all of the money he got from selling them, a reluctant Sakura agreed and the trade was made. Nobo then paid the skipper of a boat that cash to bring him, Sabu and Charlie to Sweden the next morning, I don't mention Maya's name enough but she was invaluable to Nobo making it this far. By this point there was only ten minutes to go in this 82 minute movie and none of the films have a happy ending. First Charlie was somehow noticed by some MP's on a busy Yokohama street, they shot him but Charlie would live though won't be heading to Sweden! Sakura wanted revenge on Maya and Nobo so set up a meeting, one that ended in tragedy as Sabu was shot by one of Sakura's gang who then fled the scene. It was early in the morning when that scene took place, Nobo then dashed to the pier carrying the injured Sakura with Maya helping out to make it in time for the departing boat which would give them new lives in Sweden. That never happened for Sabu died on the pier plus the group was too late for the ship was already close to a mile out to sea, wonder if Maya would have taken Charlie's place and gone to Sweden? That wraps up this review and there's no reason I can't do more that are shortish like this one was though did give some info in that intro. These five Stray Cat Rock movies are all so fast paced, fun, action packed, interesting plus feature Meiko Kaji(!) and while not classics to most of the world I consider this series to be a must watch! Did view the fifth film 'Beat '71' after this but the post is long enough so perhaps I'll have that review in the next post for this 'My Current Watches' series. Below are many screenshots from the movie and after them is the movie's original trailer which is subbed in English.
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