High and Low

High and Low (Japanese: 天国と地獄, Hepburn: Tengoku to Jigoku; lit. 'Heaven and Hell') is a 1963 Japanese police procedural directed by Akira Kurosawa. It was written by Kurosawa, Hideo Oguni, Eijirō Hisaita, and Ryūzō Kikushima as a loose adaptation of the 1959 novel King's Ransom by Evan Hunter. Starring Toshiro Mifune, Tatsuya Nakadai, Kyōko Kagawa, Tatsuya Mihashi, Yutaka Sada, and Tsutomu Yamazaki, it tells the story of Japanese businessman Kingo Gondo (Mifune) struggling for control of the major shoe company at which he is a board member. He plans a leveraged buyout of the company with his life savings, when a kidnapper mistakenly abducts his chauffeur's son to ransom him for 30 million yen. Production began in 1962 at Toho Studios. Filming took place on location at Yokohama and on set at Toho; it lasted from 2 September to 30 January 1963. The film has been seen to represent a moral conflict within the backdrop of the post–World War II Japanese economic miracle. High and Low's approach to issues of social class and narrative structure have been praised, with technical elements—such as the film's blocking—receiving particular attention. Post-production took just under a month, and after test-screenings in mid-February 1963, it received a wide distribution. High and Low was released in Japan on 1 March 1963 and received generally positive reviews both domestically and abroad. It became the highest-grossing film at the Japanese domestic box office that year. It was in the Official Selection for the Venice Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Golden Globe Awards for 1964. The film has since received greater acclaim, and is often considered to be among Kurosawa's greatest films. It is viewed as influential on police procedural cinema, and has been remade multiple times internationally.