Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #13223 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-03-28
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Black & White, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: Japanese
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 143 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Although best known for his samurai classics, Japanese master filmmaker Akira Kurosawa proved himself equally adept at contemporary dramas and thrillers, and 1962's High and Low offers a powerful showcase for Kurosawa's versatile skill. The great Toshiro Mifune stars as a wealthy industrialist who has just raised a large sum of money to execute his planned take-over of a successful shoe manufacturer. Fate intervenes when he receives a phone call informing him that his son has been kidnapped, and by unfortunate coincidence the ransom demand is nearly equivalent to the amount Mifune has raised for his corporate coup. A philosophical dilemma emerges when it is revealed that the executive's son is safe, and that it is actually his chauffeur's son who has been taken. What follows is both a tense detective thriller, as the police attempt to track down the kidnapper, and a compelling illustration of class division in Japan--the "high and low" of the title. Far be it from Kurosawa to make a mere thriller, however; this loose adaptation of the Ed McBain novel King's Ransom provides the director with ample opportunity to develop a visual strategy that perfectly enhances the story's sociological themes. --Jeff Shannon

Synopsis
Based on KING'S RANSOM, a crime novel by Ed McBain, HIGH AND LOW stars Toshiro Mifune as Kingo Gondo, a wealthy, hardworking businessman. As Gondo plans a coup that will secure his position as the head of his Yokohama shoe company, he is contacted by a criminal who informs him that he's kidnapped his son. The crook demands a huge ransom for the boy's return--an amount that has taken Gondo 30 years of labour to amass. As the worried industrialist prepares to pay the ransom, he discovers that his son is safe at home--the kidnapper has mistakenly snatched his chauffeur's son. The question quickly becomes: Does Gondo abandon his plans to pay off the criminal, or does he do the honourable thing and help save his driver's child

Customer Reviews

An Epic Thriller
Kurosawa's modern dress movies are generally less well-known than his samurai masterpieces, but critically "Ikiru" (aka "Living") has long been regarded as one of his finest films, and the same is sometimes said of this intricate police thriller.

"High and Low" is really two films in one. The first an enclosed, philosophical drama in which Toshiru Mifune gives a restrained but powerful performance as the wealthy man being blackmailed. Stagey, slightly Bergmanesque, it will not suit all contemporary viewers but it sets up the second movie: a gripping police thriller that follows the dragnet tightening on the blackmailer.

Taken as a whole the film is epic in two senses: not only is it long, at 143 minutes, but also it has a grand vision. Japanese society from the top to the bottom is the subject, and although the source material (an American thriller) remains visible, it is the director's observations of his own country that work best and stick in the mind.

This film is not ultimately as humane as "Seven Samurai" or "Hidden Fortress", but fans, for example, of the morally serious thrillers of Sidney Lumet will want to add this DVD to their collection.

THE DETECTIVE THRILLER LIKE NO OTHER
This film is so huge and is executed with such depth and precision that you just cannot fault kurosawa.
His direction of this film is split, the first half of the film is shot looking up at the characters to suggest their power and life-style.
The second half looks down on the city and slums, as they seek the kidnapper and his or her associates. Mifune is flawless as is the whole film, its just brilliant, dynamic, tense, thrilling. This is the detective film by which all detective thrillers should be measured.
A real treat, enjoy.

This is an extraordinarily fine film
I watched this a few days ago for about the fifth time and have been thinking about it ever since. I think it probably is my favorite Kurosawa film.

Toshiro Mifune plays a top executive in a shoe company who is secretly planning to take over the company. He wants to keep making quality shoes and gradually expand the market. The other executives want to make cheaper shoes and take advantage of the company's reputation. Mifune has raised every yen he can, including using his house, for the buyout, but his son is kidnapped. For the ransome he'll need all the money he's raised. He's prepared to do this for the sake of his son.

Then he finds out that the kidnappers made a mistake. They kidnapped his driver's son, who is the same age as his own. What a terrible moral dilemma. Would you or I give up every bit of money we had to save a neighbor's or an employee's son? Mifune does, and this act has a great effect on the police and the public.

The first half of the movie takes place in his house on a hill while all this unfolds. The second half is the chase to find the boy before he's killed and to capture the kidnapper. We move from the intensity of the dilemma unfolding in Mifune's home to the gritty business of the search which takes us into some of the lowest parts of the Japanese underworld.

Mifune is powerful in the role of the father, at first torn by the decision he has to make, then commited to finding his driver's son. Tatsuya Nakadai plays the detective, handsome, smooth, professional, and ultimately deeply touched by Mifune's integrity. Years later Nakadai played the leads in Kurosawa's Kagemusha and Ran. And it was good to see Mifune out of samurai costume.

High and Low is the work of a master.