Last night's revisit of the 1967 yakuza action flick A Colt is My Passport turned out to be a refreshing cinematic palate cleanser for me after several intellectually turbulent days spent contemplating my response to Robert Bresson's Mouchette. The two films were released just a few days apart back in March 1967, but beyond that they don't have much else in common, other than the emotional flatness of both Kamimura, the assassin under contract to a Japanese crime syndicate, and the eponymous girl who was directed to respond that way according to the aesthetic demands of Bresson's representational methods. While I found Mouchette's dour countenance and eventual suicide in response to her sufferings to be ultimately problematic, Joe Shishido's steely focus and impassive cool-under-pressure proved to be quite entertaining and appropriate for the character he portrayed.
Indeed, that's really the appeal of a movie like A Colt is My Passport; the vicarious enjoyment and role-modeling of a tough guy who knows that he's signed on to do some dirty work, in a line of business where he can instantly turn from predator into prey according to the whims of the bosses. His shrewd preparations to survive the inevitable hostilities, and his implacable resolve once he realizes that the tables have turned against him, are the unifying ties that bind together the most memorable episodes of this crime-based adventure.
Overall, it's a relatively simple, straightforward saga of a hit man assigned by his boss to take out the leader of a rival gang, only to find himself on the run once those in power decide that his services are no longer needed, nor is his continued existence in the yakuza underworld. The first act of the film consists of Kamimura taking the job, demonstrating his marksmanship, planning the assassination and then executing the task with impeccable efficiency and palpable suspense. It establishes the protagonist as an anti-hero who's a great asset to have on one's side, but who makes it clear that he charts his own course, maintaining loyalty more as a matter of principle than of need-driven dependency.
The middle section is a bit muddled as Kamimura and his sidekick go on the lam after their planned exit from Japan to a safe haven overseas is cut off at the airport. Knowing that all of their usual hideouts are going to be covered by their newly acquired adversaries, the pair find a truck stop off the beaten path and lay low in a well-concealed attic apartment. The set-up serves as a basis to introduce a character who turns out to be not so much a noirish femme fatale but instead, a young damsel in distress. Mina is a barmaid whose boyfriend was bumped off by the same criminal enterprise that now seeks to take Kamimura out of commission, and she sees in the rugged but honorable sniper a possible ticket that will help her escape the dreary dead end that she's been stuck in ever since.
We're also treated to a song performed by Jerry Fujio, a handsome square-jawed pop singer of the era presumably included as some kind of box office attraction. He plays Kamimura's driver who winds up getting used as leverage to force the hit man to give up his clear shot at freedom in order to do the right thing. The plot twists are rudimentary and not terribly compelling, but they do support the premise that Kamimura, though a merciless killer when so employed, does have a personal code of honor that leads him to brave deeds of self-sacrifice on behalf of others when the cause is just. His noble disregard for his own safety and somber determination to level his revenge against the jackals who betrayed him. along with a soundtrack infused with highly infectious earworm theme music, actually calls to mind the protagonist of Seijun Suzuki's Tokyo Drifter, released the previous year. The monochromatic A Colt is My Passport lacks the wild color palette and hallucinatory, abstracted set designs that Suzuki employed, eschewing all that flamboyance in favor of dockside grit and a gruff industrial working-class sensibility in its locations, but otherwise can be regarded as a worthwhile "poor man's version" follow-up for those who want more of this sort of thing.
Mainly though, the first hour of the film functions as a set-up for the final conflict between Kamimura and his would-be killers. That's the same conclusion I drew when I first wrote about A Colt is My Passport back in early 2012, and last night's viewing did nothing to change my opinion. It's a fun sequence, as phenomenally executed as it is implausibly absurd that such a showdown would ever be staged that way by the gangsters looking to take down an especially troublesome rogue operator. But there is too much entertainment value to be had here to bother spoiling it all with meticulous analysis. I was just glad to watch a movie that I didn't have to think all that strenuously about, or worry who I might irritate if I wasn't able to regard it with sufficient reverence.
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