Softwing Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Ploydsge just watch it!

Inadvands Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

RanchoTuVu Dishonorably discharged Ex-US army soldiers run a crime ring in post WW2 Tokyo. Led by Sandy Dawson (Robert Ryan), they, perhaps mistakenly, kill an active duty soldier during a job they pull as the film opens. Robert Stack plays an army agent sent over to infiltrate the ring, a group of army rejects memorably led by Robert Ryan. The finale is a totally gripping roof- top chase high over Tokyo's crowded streets. The film captures a sense of Japanese life and has impressive cultural depth, probably thanks to ace director and writer Sam Fuller. The idea itself of dishonorable discharges forming a crime ring in Tokyo is fairly well inspired, and is taken into impressive detail as the some of the guys in the gang try to be the ichi ban or number one next to Robert Ryan. Ryan has seldom looked better, capturing a smug sense of control with underlying ruthlessness. Stack as the army's secret agent, isn't bad either.

Spikeopath House of Bamboo is directed by Sam Fuller who also co-writes with Harry Kleiner. It stars Robert Ryan, Robert Stack, Shirley Yamaguchi and Cameron Mitchell. It's a CinemaScope production with colour by De Luxe, with photography by Joseph MacDonald. Leigh Harline scores the music and the film is a loose remake of The Street with No Name (1948), where Kleiner & MacDonald were also involved. The film is exclusively shot on location in Japan.Tokyo, 1954, and an underworld outfit of American ex-servicemen are thriving on criminal activity. Their newest recruit is Eddie Spanier (Stack), in town to hook up with an old friend, his plans go awry on the news that his pal was killed during a robbery. But he catches the eye of the mob leader, Sandy Dawson (Ryan), and so begins a relationship that will have far reaching consequences for everyone involved with the two men.A train draws to a halt on a bridge in snowy Tokyo, at its point of stopping the train is perfectly overlooked by a snow capped Mount Fuji. It's a moment of beauty, quite serene, then violence explodes as the train is robbed and death shatters the moment. And so Sam Fuller's House of Bamboo begins. One of the first Hollywood movies to be shot in Japan post World War II, it's a film that's as gritty as it is surprisingly violent. Yet the film is very beautiful in texture, courtesy of the location photography by the talented MacDonald who utilises the Scope format to capture some incredible visual treats. For this "noir-a-like" picture there's no shadows and fog, or off kilter angle plays, what there is is a beauty beset by ugly criminal things. Add in some Fuller oddity tones, terse dialogue in the script and some memorable moments of anger, and you get a film that can now be viewed as influential. Even if it's a picture that's hard to confidently recommend to serious fans of gangland type thrillers.Expectation, as most film lovers know, can be a burden that's capable of spoiling many a nights viewing, with that in mind, House of Bamboo comes with a warning. For in spite of the synopsis lending one to think this is a brooding nasty picture about underworld crims, it's actually more comic book than hard boiled, and a massive dose of belief suspension is needed to run with the flow. There's also an issue with some flabby filler scenes involving the relationship between Stack & Yamaguchi, so much of an issue that were it not for a great smoke bomb based escape sequence leading up to the middle third, and some splendid homo-erotic subtext in the gang, the film would find it hard to fight off charges of being melodramatic for potential romance's sake. But Fuller manages to overcome the narratives problems to finish with a most intriguing and interesting film.His cast are very efficient, where Stack is a nice fit for his character (can't say no more because of spoilers), Ryan is ominously coiled spring like and Mitchell is a chunky ball of menace. Then there is of course the director enjoying dallying with themes of duality, betrayal and racial indifference, all captured by his wonderfully fluid camera work. And thankfully the film is crowned off by an excellent finale set on a spinning rooftop amusement park viewer, one minute a stunning view across Tokyo, the next gunshots rattling the air like intruders invading your home. Beginning with stark violence and ending in much the same way, the overriding feeling seems to be that beauty can quite quickly become ugly.The positives far outweigh the negatives in the House of Bamboo. 7/10

christopher-underwood Sam Fuller's remake of 1948's, 'The Street With No Name', this is wonderful. It may not be full on noir, certainly it is in colour and cinemascope, but for me with family in Japan and a fascination for Tokyo, this is breathtaking. It helps, of course, that the cinematography is so sublime and that Fuller is so taken with the place that he includes so many incidental details, like street vendors and talk of the minutiae of Japanese culture. The story itself follows closely the earlier documentary style except here, surely, the settings are more dramatic. The movie does slow a bit after halfway but picks up magnificently for the final magnificent finale. Sandy Dawson is as effective as he was in the original and indeed all the many Americans and Japanese acquit themselves well . A good film by any standards this is a must see for anyone with the slightest interest in seeing 50s Tokyo.

OldAle1 I was pretty excited about another Fuller film after being pleasantly surprised by his first two films seen the previous week, both of which were better than their reputations. Well, everyone has their missteps and this one seems to me to be a minor and fairly pointless film from this great director. A remake of the 1948 B&W noir Street with No Name, this moves the action -- a tale of an undercover cop trying to infiltrate and ultimately take down a big crime boss -- to occupied Japan, widens the screen to 'scope format and adds bright color. Small-time hood Eddie Kenner (Robert Stack) is ostensibly in Japan to make contact with an old friend who turns out to have recently been murdered, perhaps by his own organization, a pachinko parlor cartel run by Sandy Dawson (Robert Ryan). Stack makes friends with the dead man's widow Mariko (Shirley Yamaguchi) and worms his way into Ryan's group which of course turns out to be in business for more than just a few yen from gambling parlors.The action moves reasonably well, and the location shooting is nice (first American film made in Japan, apparently), but it just wasn't gripping to me and far too predictable; the earlier version is better as are quite a number of similar-themed films from the past few years. Worth seeing for Fuller completists, and one of his few color 'scope films, but don't expect anything on the level of Park Row or Pickup on South Street. DVD rental.