SUNDAY : FILMEX REVIEWS

‘ONIMASA’

Japan, 1983, 142 minutes 12:20 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. A great yakuza (gangster) epic, directed with unstinting panache by Hideo Gosha, and starring Tatsuya Nakadai in one of his finest performances as an underworld chieftain who lives a feudal existence, complete with harem as well as henchmen, well into the first half of the 20th century. The crux of the matter is this rampant male chauvinist’s tragic impact on the lives of his embittered yet loyal wife and two daughters, one of whom is adopted, growing up to be a leftist-leaning schoolteacher. Spanning 1918 to 1940, this handsome Toei production illuminates a criminal subculture and its rituals as entrancingly as “The Godfather” did.