Former private eye Harry Kilmer knows a lot about Japan - and the gangsters who keep an iron grip on its gambling, prostitution and protection rackets. He know's there's a right way to approach the brutal underworld. And he knows there's one thing powerful mobsters respect: greater power.

Robert Mitchum is Kilmer in this haunting East meets West head on thriller powered by a team of heavy Hollywood hitters: writers Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver) and Robert Towne (Chinatown) and director Sydney Pollack (The Interpreter). Co-starring Japan's Takakura Ken and veteran character actor Brian Keith. The Yakuza is a modern film noir in which honour and loyalty become issues of life and death. Violence erupts with the speed of a Tokyo-bound bullet train. And the last thing to die is tradition.

This is a must-see. Robert Mitchum gives a brilliant performance as an ex-serviceman taking on the might of the Japanese underworld when the daughter of his best friend is kidnapped by gangsters.