The Film (4/5)

    Street Mobster is an early collaboration between director Kinji Fukasaku and actor Bunta Sugawara. As such it can be seen as a pre-cursor to the pairs iconic and legendary Battles Without Honor and Humanity Series. Street Mobster follows Sugawara as Okita a yakuza who is jailed after getting into a bloody knife fight. After getting out many years later, he tries to resume his gangland activities only to find out that life in Yakuza-land is more chill, and much more political (less violent), and not the same as when he went in. As such he is having quite a hard time adjusting to the new paradigm on the outside.

    I honestly can't think of a better director of Yakuza cinema then Kinji Fukasaku, past or present. Yeah, there are people like Takishi Miike or Takashi Kitano that make some great masterpieces within the genre, but nothing quite like Fukasaku's films. Street Mobster is an early entry in the genre from the director, but shows that he already had the pieces in play that would make films like Battles... series and Graveyard of Honor slices of violent gangster cinema perfection.

    The film is grounded by another excellent turn by Bunta Sugawara who offers a dynamic performance, at once cool and collected, and the next a rage machine. He is surrounded by a cast that offers great chemistry, and similarly memorable performances. The direction from Fukasaku is much in line with what he would do later with very loose almost documentary style handheld camera work that would give the whole piece a very kinetic energy to it.

Audio/Video (3.5/5)

    Arrow presents Street Mobster is a very solid 2:35:1 1080p transfer. Everything mostly looks fine here, grain is rendered well, detail is solid, and colors are quite stable. I did not detect much in the way of issues here.  Audio is handled by a PCM 2.0 mono track in Japanese with solid clarity.

Extras (2/5)

    We get a commentary by Tom Mes, a trailer, and a still gallery. There are also liner notes.

Overall

    A precursor to the Battles without Honor or Humanity Series, Street Mobster shows the direction Fukasaku would take yakuza cinema throughout his career. The Blu-ray looks and sound quite solid and there are some decent extras. RECOMMENDED.