Movies like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding (1967)
The best movies like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding (1967) are Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973), Female Yakuza Tale (1973) and Battles Without Honor and Humanity (1973). If The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding hooked you with its action and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedSeven Samurai (1954)8.5/10 from 4,461 votes
- NewestBad City (2022)Released 2022
- In JapaneseBattles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973)Also in Japanese
Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973)
Repeatedly beat to a pulp by gamblers, cops, and gangsters, lone wolf Shoji Yamanaka finally finds a home as a Muraoka family hitman and falls in love with boss Muraoka's niece. Meanwhile, the ambitions of mad dog Katsutoshi Otomo draws our series' hero, Shozo Hirono, and the other yakuza into a new round of bloodshed.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & action
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFemale Yakuza Tale (1973)
Ocho is accidentally captured by a drug trafficking cartel who use Chinese women to smuggle drugs into Japan by hiding it in their vaginas. She is tortured, and manages to escape, fighting both the male yakuzas and a gang of female thieves.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBattles Without Honor and Humanity (1973)
In the teeming black markets of postwar Japan, Shozo Hirono and his buddies find themselves in a new war between factious and ambitious yakuza.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisZatoichi the Outlaw (1967)
When a local gambling house kidnaps some peasants because they failed to pay their debts, a rival gambling house pays their debts and sets them free.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBlack Rain (1989)
Two New York cops get involved in a gang war between members of the Yakuza, the Japanese Mafia. They arrest one of their killers and are ordered to escort him back to Japan. However, in Japan he manages to escape, and as they try to track him down, they get deeper and deeper into the Japanese Mafia scene and they have to learn that they can only win by playing the game—the Japanese way.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSympathy for the Underdog (1971)
A yakuza gang gets driven out of Yokohama by a big gang from Tokyo. They relocate to Okinawa to violently start over.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & action
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFight, Zatoichi, Fight (1964)
Blind swordsman/masseuse Zatoichi befriends a young woman returning home with her baby. When gangsters mistake her for Zatoichi and kill her, Zatoichi determines to escort the baby to its father. He gains the reluctant help of a young pick pocket and together they travel to find the baby's father. But they do not reckon on the father's reaction to their arrival, nor on their own growing feelings for the child.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Tale of Zatoichi (1962)
The adventures of a blind, gambling masseur and master swordsman. Zatoichi targets a yakuza-controlled village, because war with a neighbouring town's smaller gang is brewing.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Return of Sister Street Fighter (1975)
When Koryu's childhood friend Shurei is abducted by gangsters, the desperate young woman recruits a female martial artist and a tough-as-nails stranger to join her for a dangerous rescue mission.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIn Full Bloom (2019)
Set shortly after the end of World War II, a philosophical boxing drama of two fighters from opposite worlds (USA and Japan) who are pulled together for a questionable fight arranged by their unscrupulous managers and the Yakuza.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisZatoichi's Pilgrimage (1966)
Zatoichi's trek through 88 temples to atone for his violent past is interrupted as he stumbles into a village terrorized by a violent yakuza boss.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & action
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSword of the Beast (1965)
Legendary swordplay filmmaker Hideo Gosha's Sword of the Beast chronicles the flight of the low-level swordsman Gennosuke, who kills one of his ministers as part of a reform plot. His former comrades then turn on him, and this betrayal so shakes his sense of honor that he decides to live in the wild, like an animal. There he joins up with a motley group who are illegally mining the shogun’s gold, and, with the aid of another swordsman, gets a chance not just at survival but to recover his name and honor.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Outsider (2018)
A former American G.I. joins a yakuza family after his release from prison in post-World War II Osaka.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Yakuza (1974)
When George Tanner does business with high-ranking Yakuza Tono, Tono kidnaps his daughter, and George summons his old friend, private eye Harry Kilmer, to Japan to investigate.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDarc (2018)
To bring down a global human trafficking ring, an Interpol agent recruits the help of a brutal criminal with inside knowledge of the yakuza.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBad City (2022)
Kensuke Sonomura directs the legendary Hitoshi Ozawa in this ultimate V-Cinema actioner. Kaiko City is plagued with poverty and crime. When a corrupt businessman decides to run for mayor and starts eliminating opponents from the rival mafia, a former police captain serving time for murder is secretly released and put in charge of a special task force to arrest him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGraveyard of Honor (1975)
A self-destructive man becomes a powerful member of the yakuza but quickly loses his self-control. Based on the true story of Rikio Ishikawa.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisYouth of the Beast (1963)
When a mysterious stranger muscles into two rival yakuza gangs, Tokyo's underworld explodes with violence.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Worth the HypeMovies like thisDead or Alive (1999)
Ryūichi and his small gang of Triad vie for control of the Japanese underworld in a crime-ridden Shinjuku quarter while Detective Jojima tries to bring it down.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBeyond Outrage (2012)
As the police launch a full-scale crackdown on organized crime, it ignites a national yakuza struggle between the Sanno of the East and Hanabishi of the West. What started as an internal strife in Outrage has now become a nationwide war in Outrage Beyond.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both action
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Karate Kid Part II (1986)
Summoned by his dying father, Miyagi returns to his homeland of Okinawa, with Daniel, after a 40-year exile. There he must confront Yukie, the love of his youth, and Sato, his former best friend turned vengeful rival. Sato is bent on a fight to the death, even if it means the destruction of their village. Daniel finds his own love in Yukia's niece, Kumiko, and his own enemy in Sato's nephew, the vicious Chozen. Now, far away from the tournaments, cheering crowds and safety of home, Daniel will face his greatest challenge ever when the cost of honor is life itself.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisShaft's Big Score! (1972)
John Shaft is back as the lady-loved black detective cop on the search for the murderer of a client.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSeven Samurai (1954)
A samurai answers a village's request for protection after he falls on hard times. The town needs protection from bandits, so the samurai gathers six others to help him teach the people how to defend themselves, and the villagers provide the soldiers with food.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action & drama
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMumon: The Land of Stealth (2017)
Raised suckling poison arrows among the sparring Iga ninja factions, Mumon is a carefree 16th-century mercenary. When the ninja council makes a power play to defeat the young Nobukatsu Oda struggling to step into his father’s warlord shoes as they expand rule across the country, Mumon jumps into the fray to satisfy his new bride Okuni’s demand that he make good on his promises of wealth. Yet Mumon soon finds what is worth fighting for beyond money or nation.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHiroshima (1953)
Historical fiction about the aftermath of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan, on 6 August 1945, and its effects on various civilians, especially children, of that city.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
blank13 (2018)
Thirteen years after abandoning his wife and two sons by stepping out for a pack of cigarettes and never returning, deadbeat gambler Masato dies of stomach cancer. At his funeral, a motley crew of fellow mahjong players, pachinko parlor employees and former drinking buddies gather to pay their respects and tell stories, revealing aspects of Masato’s life that complicate his sons’ resentment towards him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
On This Earth (1957)
Ichiro’s family used to be a large landowner, but now he is living in poverty with his mother. His mother works hard to get her son through school. Under such circumstances, Ichiro meets Wakako, the daughter of a wealthy man, and they fall in love with each other, but they are opposed by those around them because of their different social status.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Thanks for the Tears (1965)
A film about two men who join the fight against a gang selling weapons.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
Code Between Brothers: All New (1970)
When the boss of the Nakano Family decides to retire and makes a loyal follower the new boss instead of his own son, it causes strife in the family. Sides are taken and lines are drawn. Meanwhile, a rival family with a land dispute with the Nakano starts pulling strings behind the scenes...
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
You Only Live Twice (1967)
A mysterious spacecraft captures Russian and American space capsules and brings the two superpowers to the brink of war. James Bond investigates the case in Japan and comes face to face with his archenemy Blofeld.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both action
Popcorn FlickMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding?
The closest matches to The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding are Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973), Female Yakuza Tale (1973) and Battles Without Honor and Humanity (1973). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding?
Start with Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973), the closest match to The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding?
Seven Samurai (1954), rated 8.5/10 by 4,461 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding?
Bad City (2022) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Japanese movies like The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding?
Yes: Battles Without Honor and Humanity: Deadly Fight in Hiroshima (1973), Female Yakuza Tale (1973) and Battles Without Honor and Humanity (1973).
How are movies similar to The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Kanto Region Is Also Expanding, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.