Investigating: Tokyo Vice “The Yakuza” | Behind the Scenes | Max - video Dailymotion

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“Terrible actions have a mortal price.” The #TokyoVice cast and crew discuss the changing times, extremely high stakes, and more in Season 2. Tokyo Vice is now streaming now on Max.

Transcript

00:00 [dramatic music]

00:01 - There's this underworld of criminals.

00:03 They take advantage of people.

00:04 They kill people.

00:06 - Best analogy for American audiences is the Marines,

00:09 in that you do not question the commander above you,

00:12 and the hierarchy is everything.

00:14 [speaking in Japanese]

00:17 - During our time period, which is 1999 into 2000,

00:24 we go a lot deeper in the ways Yakuza culture

00:27 was developing in terms of resorting to guns,

00:30 in terms of cops finally cracking down.

00:32 Deputy Superintendent Degatta

00:34 from the National Police Force has come in with new ideas

00:36 on how to defeat the Yakuza.

00:38 [speaking in Japanese]

00:41 - The Hishinuma raid in episode three

00:50 really is our first big set piece,

00:52 and we folded in the stunt coordinator

00:54 and started working with Miki Maia.

00:56 [speaking in Japanese]

00:59 - She was just so fluid and fast, it was remarkable.

01:11 [speaking in Japanese]

01:14 - Because of the government crackdown,

01:16 the Yakuza Gumi had to shape-shift

01:20 and insinuate themselves more into legitimate businesses.

01:23 I wanted Tozawa and his men to look like

01:26 Goldman Sachs bankers with guns,

01:28 because they are changing the rules of the Yakuza.

01:30 [speaking in Japanese]

01:33 - We specifically had Ashida with his back

01:42 towards the long hallway,

01:43 so that we could have Tozawa looming in the background,

01:46 coming and then reveal him standing over Ashida.

01:49 [speaking in Japanese]

01:52 - And that Yakuza summit on the rooftop

01:54 is when you finally figure out what Tozawa's been up to.

01:56 It was all a trap.

01:58 [speaking in Japanese]

02:01 - The real iconic moment for me

02:06 was when all the Oebuns are excused

02:08 and you have the whole city in the background,

02:11 the two bosses, who's gonna be the king of Tokyo?

02:14 - A war is coming, a Yakuza war.

02:17 Guns are anathema from a moral standpoint for the Yakuza,

02:20 but finally Ashida's like, "Yeah, we need guns."

02:23 [speaking in Japanese]

02:26 - We went to Nagano,

02:27 we went up into the mountains in the snow.

02:29 We would finally be able to get outside of Tokyo

02:32 and open up the scope of the show a little bit.

02:35 - Just the scenery is really refreshing to see

02:37 after shooting so many days in Tokyo.

02:39 We took time finding the right location

02:42 for them walking in the woods.

02:44 [speaking in Japanese]

02:49 [speaking in Japanese]

02:52 - And then we found a really nice location with a tunnel

02:54 that really works for the scene.

02:56 [speaking in Japanese]

02:58 - And then the other thing that was really important

03:00 was trying to ground that whole sequence in Sato,

03:03 seeing it through his eyes as Sato starts to realize

03:05 that Hayama is a real problem.

03:07 - There's a lot of death in this season.

03:11 The midpoint of season two is an assassination attempt

03:15 on Ashida in Samantha's Club.

03:17 We shot it across three days.

03:19 It was very carefully storyboarded, very carefully planned.

03:22 - We shot it quite slowly,

03:24 which is the best way I think to capture

03:26 those intimate character moments

03:28 inside of some big action sequence.

03:31 [speaking in Japanese]

03:34 - There were a number of gun battles that erupted

03:36 more in the early '90s than in the late '90s,

03:38 so we're sliding the timeline a little bit.

03:40 - One of the challenges was how much we should do on set

03:45 and how much we should do on post.

03:47 Some scenes we did with scrapes

03:49 and then the other parts we did with the blue screen.

03:52 It's a balance between being efficient and effective.

03:56 [speaking in Japanese]

03:59 [gunshots]

04:06 [speaking in Japanese]

04:12 [speaking in Japanese]

04:15 - As far as how he dies, that was all on Ashun-san.

04:26 He had a very specific idea

04:28 of how he wants to fight against those gunmen.

04:31 - Especially for actors who play Yakuza,

04:34 it's a great honor to have a good death.

04:36 [gunshots]

04:39 - I want our audience to grieve

04:41 and be shocked when people pass.

04:43 [speaking in Japanese]

04:46 - And we all know it's Tozawa,

04:47 but of course he's left no fingerprints.

04:49 [speaking in Japanese]

04:54 - He immediately understands that Sato is beloved

05:06 within the Chiharukai

05:08 and therefore sets out to make him his enemy.

05:10 [speaking in Japanese]

05:13 - Terrible actions have a moral price.

05:34 If people don't die,

05:35 the price of people's actions isn't clear.

05:38 - This is only the first step

05:39 in whatever Tozawa was planning.

05:41 [gunshot]

05:43 [explosion]

05:45 [whoosh]

05:46 [explosion]

05:47 [whoosh]

05:48 [whoosh]

05:49 [whoosh]

05:50 [whoosh]

05:52 [silence]

05:55 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Investigating: Tokyo Vice “The Yakuza” | Behind the Scenes | Max

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