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You can stream Rusty Knife (1958) on Criterion Channel with a subscription.

Udaka is a new, post-war city where corruption has already taken hold. A persistent district attorney wants to arrest and convict Katsumata, a laughing, self-confident thug. The D.A. gets an anonymous letter about the suicide five years' before of a city council member. Evidence about the case leads the D.A. to Tachibana, struggling to go straight after involvement with the mob and a prison sentence for killing the man responsible for the rape and suicide of his fiancée. One of Tachibana's friends is Keiko, the daughter of the dead councilman and the ward of another powerful official. How do these stories connect?

A manic, infectious laugh defines the criminal at the center of this jagged post-war crime drama. This pursuit of a slippery thug through a landscape of systemic bribery turns a simple investigation into a frantic race against urban rot.

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