Welcome back to Movie Recaps. Today I will show you a thriller, drama film from 2009,
titled Kaiji: The Ultimate Gambler. Spoilers ahead! Watch out and take care.
It's a stormy night in the city when Kazutaka Hyoudou, wealthy socialite and president of the
financial consulting firm Teiai Corporation, asks his employees what gives man the ultimate power.
They have many answers for him, like military power and market dominance, and Rinko Endou is
scolded when she replies money since that's too basic - the real point is what you do with it.
However, Yukio Tonegawa is praised by his boss for answering that power is having the financial
muscle to build your own kingdom, like a fallout shelter. He also points out that Japan is filled
with hopeless young men that will serve as labor for construction. Sometime later, Kaiji Itou is
going through his usual daily routine. He buys and loses at scratch-offs, spends a very boring
day at his work as a cashier in a convenience store, and on his way home, he curses all the
rich cars around him for being successful because they evade taxes and not because they work hard.
When he kicks a Mercedes, a group of bodyguards chases him for it, and from that car also comes
out Rinko, who takes him to an office to talk. A couple of years ago, Kaiji signed a loan contract
to be a friend's guarantor, and since that friend has disappeared, it is now his obligation to pay
the debt. To make matters worse, the original sum of three hundred thousand yen has now become
a debt of two million because of interests, not to speak of the car damage he's caused. Since he
can't pay that amount, Rinko offers him a deal: there's a gambling cruise he can participate in,
filled with broke losers like him, and if he wins, his debt will be wiped clean. After Rinko
gives him a speech on how crappy his life is and this being the only opportunity to start over,
Kaiji accepts. Later in the evening, while Rinko hands in Kaiji's profile at the company mentioning
she's filled her quota, Kaiji gets onboard the cruise, which is indeed filled with broke losers.
Yukio is the host and the one that will explain the rules of the game they'll be playing tonight.
Each player is given three one million yen stars with an interest of one percent per
minute - if someone wins, not only will the company wipe the debt clean, they'll buy back
the stars too. Players are also given twelve rock-paper-scissors cards that they'll use
to play the game as usual - each time they win a round, they get a star from their opponent.
To win, they must use all their twelve cards and have at least three stars after thirty minutes.
No questions are allowed, and after Yukio calls them babies, he leaves so they can
start playing. All the players rush to find an opponent and Kaiji is approached by Jouji Funai,
a man that proposes a truce: if they play the same cards and cause a draw,
they won't lose any stars and will get rid of their cards quickly, giving them an easy way out.
Kaiji accepts and the game begins normally, helping both players lose their cards with
no issues. But at the last minute, Funai backstabs Kaiji and scams him out of two stars
by playing to win instead of to draw, leaving him with just one star and one card. Furious,
Kaiji drops his card and punches Funai, causing him to bleed on the floor and the card as well.
Security quickly separates them, but soon a new commotion begins: Funai tells everyone
that Kaiji's last card is scissors so everyone would go after him for an easy star, and Kaiji
retaliates by announcing Funai only has rock left. Everyone starts arguing over this possibly being a
trick or not, and they're suddenly interrupted by a guard that brings Kouji Ishida back into
the game after he was caught trying to flush his cards down the toilet, which is against the rules.
With ten minutes left on the clock, Funai takes advantage of the moment to announce his latest
idea: a reshuffle, that way nobody will know each other's cards anymore. Everyone accepts,
including Kaiji, because he has a plan. Funai takes all the cards, shuffles them, then gives
each player back the same amount they had before. Kaiji receives the card with the bloodstain
again and decides to team up with Ishida to play against Funai on a one-card match for three stars.
Funai is sure he will win because he knows Kaiji's last card, but Kaiji expected this and
defeats him easily. This was his plan all along: knowing Funai would've noticed the blood mark,
Kaiji took one of Ishida's cards and added blood on it to make it pass as his own stained card,
tricking Funai into playing the incorrect one. After dividing Funai's stars between them so they
both have three, Kaiji and Ishida play their last cards by tying on purpose and win - or at least,
that's what they think. Because while they're in the middle of celebrating as the time runs out,
Ishida finds a card in his pocket he forgot about. Since Kaiji sticks to his promise of a team-up and
accepts the card as his as well, both of them lose. They are taken to work deep underground
in forced labor for the construction of Hyoudou's kingdom. The conditions are awful: the hours are
long, they don't have breaks, their meals are incredibly basic, and they all bunk together in
a very small space to sleep on the floor. They're also branded on their shoulders with a microchip
so they can't escape, and their pay is pathetic: it's not even in yen, they're paid in their own
currency called perica, with is only valid in the underground. It's worth a tenth of a yen,
making Kaiji's salary three hundred fifty yen per day, which is around three dollars.
As little as it may be, Kaiji thinks of saving up the money to be able to pay his debt,
but soon the temptations arrive: a cart offering beer and tasty greasy food.
He manages to turn down the offer at first, but after the foreman gifts him a free beer for being
his first one and whispers sweet words about how delicious everything is, Kaiji desperately gives
in and ends up spending almost all his money on snacks and more beer. Most workers do the same,
and this is the way the company keeps them there working for free for years.
The next day, an earthquake shakes their working area and Ishida gets hurt. Kaiji hurries to take
him to the infirmary, where he discovers most patients aren't being treated because they must
pay with perica if they want medicine. There, they meet Makoto Sahara, who tells them he overheard
the foreman making fun of them and explaining how the system is designed for them to fail.
They begin losing hope, but the doctor tells them not to worry because they'll be collecting people
for the Brave Men Road soon. The next time the snacks cart comes around, Kaiji calls out the
foreman for his trickery and asks his coworkers to wake up from a dream that is never going to
happen. Their argument is interrupted when some guards come to pick Sahara up because he's been
chosen for the Brave Men Road, a very dangerous game where winning gives you freedom but losing
takes your life. Ready to take the risk, Kaiji volunteers to go too, and Ishida also joins them.
All the chosen players are blindfolded and get their hands tied up as they're taking to their
destination, although Kaiji can tell they're being put in a vehicle and then an elevator.
When they're finally allowed to see again, they discover they're on the roof of a skyscraper and
Yukio is here again to explain the rules. Each player is given a voucher for ten million yen
and to cash it, they must go to the hotel across the street by crossing the Brave Men Road, which
consists of two rather narrow beams. They can't even crawl on them because they're electrocuted,
walking while keeping balance is the only option - such rule is in place to make the game harder but
also more interesting since it's being transmitted to a bunch of socialites as reality entertainment.
The players are too scared at first, but when Kaiji accepts to participate,
he inspires the others to join as well. Yukio goes back to the hotel where he and
Rinko will be hosting for the socialites that are watching the game. Meanwhile, Kaiji draws lines
on everyone's shoes so they can align them with the middle of the beam and keep better balance.
The group slowly begins making their way across the beams, and Kaiji almost slips,
but he manages to recover his balance before the worst happens. But soon everyone gets nervous when
a bolt of lightning strikes nearby, promising a storm. One of the players is too anxious to
continue but Sahara refuses to help him, so he ends up slipping, getting electrocuted,
and falling off the beam. This loss immediately lowers everybody's morale and one by one,
the players fall off to their deaths until only Kaiji, Sahara, and Ishida are left. Each fall is
celebrated by the watchers as if it was a point gained in a sports match, which disgusts Rinko.
The storm soon reaches the players, and while Sahara and Kaiji refuse to give up, Ishida does
admit his time has come. He gives Kaiji his voucher, asking him to cash it and send the
money to his daughter, and as soon as Kaiji turns around, Ishida lets his body fall in complete
silence to spare his friend from the panic. Slowly but surely, Sahara and Kaiji finish crossing the
beams and reach the hotel door, but Kaiji worries when he sees Hyoudou watching them from a window.
His instincts are right, there's a final trick waiting for them: when Sahara opens the door,
he's hit by a windblast caused by the difference in air pressure and falls. Kaiji slips as well,
but he manages to hold onto the ledge and climb back, proceeding to enter the building through
the door to become the first person to ever win at Brave Men Road. Hyoudou congratulates Kaiji for it
and grants Yukio a citizenship in his kingdom for having provided such a great show. Kaiji demands
to be paid, but the news he hears isn't great: Ishida's voucher is invalid because he's dead,
and from the ten million Kaiji won, they'll take the debt-money he owes them. So all he has left
in the end are seven hundred fifty thousand yen, around seven thousand dollars. At least
he has his freedom, but he's still furious that he won't get to send the money to Ishida's daughter,
so he tries to punch Yukio, only to be stopped by the guards. Hyoudou is impressed by his attitude,
so he gives Kaiji one last chance to play one more game. The game is called E-cards and his opponent
will be Yukio himself. Each player receives five cards: four citizens and either an emperor or a
slave. The gameplay is simple: the slave team picks a card first and puts it face down on the
table, then the emperor team responds with a card of his own. When the cards are revealed,
they decide who wins by following a simple rule: citizen vs citizen is a draw, citizen beats slave,
emperor beats citizen, and slave beats emperor. Putting down cards randomly isn't allowed,
Kaiji must look at them and choose accordingly. There will be three rounds, and the bet is ten
to one, with ten being the slave side. This is why Kaiji chooses to play as the slave even if
he's at a disadvantage: he'll have to play first, his opponent will be able to read his expression,
and the odds of the slave winning are one-fifth. This match is so important that they're even
showing it on the underground tv. Kaiji begins by playing two citizens, getting two draws,
but when he plays the slave, Yukio immediately can tell and defeats him. Hyoudou is disappointed
that it's ended so quickly, so he lends Kaiji some money so he can play again.
This time, Kaiji watches Yukio and realizes that he doesn't look at him in return or even at his
own cards, which is very strange. He decides to send the slave first as a surprise tactic,
but once again, Yukio can tell he's played that card and easily defeats him. As the guards come
to take Kaiji away for losing, he notices that Yukio is wearing a different watch.
On his way out, Kaiji begins reviewing in his head all the details about the game, trying to find out
how it has been fixed. When Rinko comes by to make fun of him and call him a branded loser,
Kaiji realizes the microchip on his arm is the key to all this: Yukio has put on a watch that
allows him to read Kaiji's vitals and that's why he could know when he plays a difficult card.
Kaiji begins crying and making a scene, thinking he'll spend his entire life underground,
but as he remembers all the tricks that have been used in all t so far,
he comes up with a plan. First, he asks for permission to go to the bathroom before leaving.
Once in there, he calls Rinko over, knowing she's waiting at the door.
Then he tells her about his plan and convinces her to lend him fifty million yen to play once more,
claiming he knows deep inside, she's a good person. Rinko ends up agreeing and takes him
back to the game room, where Hyoudou is pleased by this surprise and orders Yukio to play against
Kaiji again. Before they start though, Kaiji hits his head against the mirror a couple of times so
his vitals show crazy numbers on Yukio's watch all the time. At the table, he grabs three cards and
hides them on his lap, but then changes one while Yukio isn't looking, and the two remaining cards
on the table end up with bloodstains on them when Kaiji shakes his head. The game begins and for
the first time in his life, Yukio is nervous and unsure because he can't rely on the watch anymore.
The first cards they play are citizens so it's a draw, but the second round is when
things get interesting: Kaiji plays a card with a bloodstain on it. Yukio remembers that
the two remaining cards on the table when the bleeding happened were the slave and a citizen,
so he plays a citizen for that fifty-fifty chance. Kaiji's card is also a citizen so this is another
draw, but Yukio now gets confident: this means the next bloodstained card will be the slave.
After one more citizen draw, they're down to two cards, and Kaiji plays the other bloodstained one.
Believing it to be the slave, Yukio is about to play a citizen but stops himself when he realizes
Kaiji must've seen the blood because it's the same trick he had used back on the cruise.
He also realizes he saw Kaiji swap one of the cards after he took the first three,
which means the one on the table now is also a citizen and this has been a trick all along.
Confident in his conclusion, Yukio plays the emperor, only to get the biggest shock of the day:
Kaiji has played the slave, so he wins the game. As the workers underground celebrate the victory,
Kaiji explains he never swapped the cards, he only pretended he did. Hyoudou gets furious
with Yukio for having lost him a lot of money, so after hitting him with his cane, he revokes
his citizenship in the kingdom and sends him to work underground for the rest of his life.
The next day, Kaiji and Rinko divide the money while celebrating over lunch.
But suddenly, Kaiji passes out because Rinko has put something in his drink.
When he wakes up later, all the bags with the money and Rinko herself are gone, but she's left
behind a letter explaining she's taken the money because Kaiji didn't think of the interest per
minute on the loan and the payment for the car damage he still owed her. In the end, he's only
left with four hundred fifty thousand yen, around four thousand dollars. Kaiji freaks out while
Rinko gets away in her car and throws her company pass out of the window, enjoying her newfound
freedom and accepting she isn't a good person after all. Sometime later, Ishida's daughter
receives an anonymous envelope with four hundred fifty thousand yen and her father's game voucher.