Murder at the ballpark: they called it a heart attack, but that poison didn't bathe itself.
Private eye Bannai Tarao (Chiezo Kataoka) and his assistant Masako (Chizuru Kitagawa) investigate the mysterious murder of a baseball player who was killed in the middle of a game.
Acting
Chiezo Kataoka's Bannai: bowler hat, fake mustaches, zero chill
Direction
Matsuda crams a stadium's worth of conspiracy into 80 minutes
Costume
The disguises are gloriously obvious and we love them
Director
Sadatsugu Matsuda
Chiezo Kataoka
Bannai Tarao
Susumu Namishima
Hidehiko Nitta
Chizuru Kitagawa
Masako Takamori
Yuriko Tashiro
Yuko Kawase
Sumiko Hidaka
Emi Ishikawa
Masao Mishima
Haruo Kuboki
Takamaru Sasaki
Inspector Osawa
Daisuke Katō
Goro Seo
Masao Shimizu
Tosuke Kawase
Eijirō Kataoka
Keiichi Togawa
Yoshi Katō
Chief Inspector Udagawa
Tōru Abe
Second baseman Aoike
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Chiezo Kataoka played Bannai Tarao in over 20 films; this was peak franchise energy before franchises were cool.
1955 Japan: baseball fever collided with postwar cynicism. Murder at the stadium mirrored real anxieties about corruption in 'pure' national institutions.
1946
1947
1948
1948
1953
1954
1955
1955
7.01956
1958
6.01960
JP
