British Film Institute
High and Low Blu-ray BFI 1963 & Akira Kurosawa Toshiro Mifune
High and Low Blu-ray BFI 1963 & Akira Kurosawa Toshiro Mifune
Couldn't load pickup availability
An intense ransom thriller from cinematic master Akira Kurosawa!
Introducing BFI's Blu-ray (Region B) Limited Edition release for 1963's High and Low. Based on an Ed McBain novel, High and Low is a gripping police thriller starring Toshiro Mifune. Wealthy industrialist Kingo Gondo (Mifune) faces an agonising choice when a ruthless kidnapper, aiming to snatch his young son, takes the chauffeur’s boy by mistake – but still demands the ransom, leaving Gondo facing ruin if he pays up.
An anatomy of the inequalities in modern Japanese society, High and Low is a complex film noir, where the intense police hunt for the kidnapper is accompanied by penetrating insight into the kidnapper’s state of mind. Kurosawa’s virtuoso direction provides no easy answers, and in short, the police and the criminal as equally brutal, but nonetheless human.
IMPORTANT NOTE: An all-region Blu-ray player is required to view this movie. Standard U.S. Blu-ray players will NOT read Region B discs. If you're looking for a reliable all-region player, we've got you covered!
Limited Edition Features:
- FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated booklet with new essay on the film by Alex Barrett, archive essay by Philip Kemp and an original review from Monthly Film Bulletin
Features:
- Presented in High Definition
- Newly recorded audio commentary by Japanese film expert Jasper Sharp
- Akira Kurosawa: It is Wonderful to Create – High and Low (2002, 38 mins): the director discusses how High and Low came to exist, and how specific sequences were filmed. Also features interviews with actors Tatsuya Nakadai, Kyoko Kagawa, Takeshi Kato, and Tatsuya Mihashi, as well as cameraman Takao Saito and Masaharu Ueda and script supervisor Teruyo Nogami
Technical Specs:
- Country: Japan
- Language: Japanese
- Year: 1963
- Runtime: 149
- Subtitles: Optional English subtitles

