Among Kobayashi Akira’s best known films internationally, Hasebe Yasuharu’s Ore ni Sawaru to Abunai ze (Black Tight Killers, 1966), is also one of his most atypical. Kobayashi plays a photojournalist back from the Vietnam War, who takes a pretty flight attendant (Matsuhara Chieko) to dinner, but before the check arrives, she is kidnapped. A gang of girls in black tights rescue her, but leave a body behind. The cops pin the deed on Kobayashi and he has to go on the lam.
What’s all the hullabaloo about? The flight attendant’s father returned from Okinawa after World War II with a large haul of Imperial Army gold. He hid it - and now a gang of Japanese yakuza and Americans crooks are after it. Meanwhile, a gang of female martial artists from Okinawa - the tights wearers - are going for the gold as well, using bubble gum and 45 rpm records as weapons. Kobayashi gamely goes through his paces, while the campy, candy-colored, go-go action unfolds around him in this ratchety but entertaining James-Bond-ish spoof.