An interesting aspect of Yakuza Graveyard is that it is also an attack on Japanese cultural and ethnic xenophobia: Kuroiwa himself is Japanese but born in Japanese-occupied Manchuria, Keiko is half-Korean, Kuroiwa's Yakut's friend is Korean, one of Kuroiwa's street-thug followers is is half-black. All of them, it is made plain, were bullied in childhood for their differences and that is what has made them what they are. Kuroiwa and his friend are also differentiated by the way they dress- from the start Kurowaiwa is dressed in street clothes, his friend changes from the formal suit and tie of a senior yakuza's in the course of the film. Police and yakuzas are portrayed as representatives of business, dressed in salary-man suits and following strict codes of behaviour.
Review of Yakuza Graveyard
