High and Low (1963)
In the midst of an attempt to take over his company, a powerhouse executive is hit with a huge ransom demand when his chauffeur's son is kidnapped by mistake.
- Akira Kurosawa
- Yōichi Matsue
- Kenjirô Ohmori
- Teruyo Nogami
- Masanobu Deme
- Shirō Moritani
- Eijirō Hisaita
- Ryūzō Kikushima
- Hideo Oguni
- Akira Kurosawa
- Evan Hunter
Rating: 8.3/10 by 911 users
Alternative Title:
High and Low - US
天堂与地狱 - CN
Céu e o Inferno - BR
El cielo y el infierno - AR
Рай и ад - BG
Himmel og helvede - DK
El infierno del odio - ES
Taivas ja helvetti - FI
Entre le ciel et l'enfer - FR
O dolofonos tou Tokyo - GR
Tengoku to jigoku - JP
High and Low - CA
High and Low - GB
The Ransom - GB
Menny és pokol - HU
High and Low - IE
Anatomia di un rapimento - IT
Cielo e infierno - MX
Niebo i piekło - PL
Između neba i zemlje - RS
Himmel och helvete - SE
Nebo a peklo - SK
Рай и ад - RU
Heaven and Hell - US
The Ransom - JP
Heaven and Hell - JP
天國與地獄 - TW
천국과 지옥 - KR
Himmel og helvete - NO
Country:
Japan
Language:
日本語
Runtime: 02 hour 22 minutes
Budget: $250,000
Revenue: $0
Plot Keyword: chauffeur, police, ransom, manager, kidnapping, blackmail, baby-snatching, film noir, shoe, japanese noir, emaciation
I didn't take to this initially. The scenario reminded me a little of an episode of "Columbo" - a rather sterile, studio-set environment that came across as quite limiting. Once it gets going, though, it's one of the best crime thrillers I've seen in ages. It all centres around the kidnapping of a small boy for whom the anger-prone, shoe millionaire "Gondo" (a strong contribution from Toshirô Mifune) is supposed to pay a ransom of ¥30 million - a colossal sum. It turns out, though, that it's not his son who has been snatched - it's the child of his chauffeur. Why ought he to pay? Will he just get on with his impending company takeover or will he risk bankruptcy for the young "Shinichi"? This is a film split into three sections. The first deals with the decision making process around will he/won't he/why should he. Next, the police must try to apprehend this individual. This process is meticulously carried out and Kurosawa has chosen to immerse us in some of that detail, rather than just cursorily skip through it. This makes the whole detection process a much more interesting part of the film; allowing some aspects of the characterisation of the police officers to develop and also introducing some dark humour to the proceedings. Finally, we reach the denouement with it's own rather curious and not entirely explicable agenda. There's an element of "what would you do?", there's a grim depiction of a seamier side of Japanese (heroin-fuelled) culture that we seldom get to see and there is a rather starkly effective dose of humanity presented here as the story juggles aspects of human nature, nurture and good old fashioned greed in quite an effective fashion. It's based on an Ed McBain book (which I haven't read) but the entire project has been successfully subsumed into it's guest culture for a gripping and detailed mystery that flies by.
