Cast Member: Susumu Fujita

‘Chuji The Gambler’ is a superb marriage of a director’s craft and an actor with a transcendent charisma that seeps off the screen.

It’s rough around the edges to be sure, but there’s much to be savoured here; Kurosawa gets more out of this condensed 80 minutes than many filmmakers get from three hours or so.

From the opening frames to the triumphant ending, every frame in this work of sublime cinema is an unbridled joy, an ingenious mixture of excitement, character and dry humour.