Sonny Chiba's first martial arts film, a partially fictionalized judo biopic based on prominent judoka Shiro Saigo (Chiba), the second student of judo founder Jigoro Kano (Naoki Sugiura). Akira Kurosawa’s Sanshiro Sugata is based on the same character and shares some scenes, but Judo for Life focuses more on the martial arts philosophy and training, including scenes depicting how the protagonist learned his famous cat-like landing, coined the term judo, and trained with Tsunejiro Tomita (Hideo Murata). There’s also a slight yakuza film influence. The port street ambush scene is found in both films, but in Judo for Life it’s not Kano but a travelling yakuza that jumps out of the rickshaw. Entertaining and beautifully old fashioned, one does however with there were more shades of gray between good and evil, and a stronger ninkyo-like moral / honour conflict.

Cast

Sonny Chiba

Naoki Sugiura

Takashi Kanda

Hideo Murata

Hisako Tsukuba

Harumi Sone

Yoshiko Sakuma

Fumitake Ōmura

Tokue Hanazawa

Harue Tone

Ken Sudo

Shunji Sayama

Rinichi Yamamoto

Nobuo Yana

Akikane Sawa

Hideo Murota