On the same year that she defined the action heroine with her role in the Female Prisoner Scorpion series, Japanese screen legend Meiko Kaji teamed up with future Sister Street Fighter director Kazuhiko Yamaguchi for a diptych of gambling, deception and violence set on the mean streets of 1970s’ Tokyo: Wandering Ginza Butterfly and its sequel She Cat Gambler!

The first film sees Kaji’s character Nami “The Red Cherry Blossom” returning to her old stomping ground in the seedy Tokyo district of Ginza after a stint in prison for killing a yakuza boss. She soon settles in, living in her uncle’s pool hall and working at the local hostess club. But when ruthless yakuza Owada (Koji Nanbara, 11 Samurai) attempts to take control of the club, Nami and her uncle devise a plan to take him down. In the sequel, Kaji is paired up with the equally legendary Sonny Chiba at his most charismatic as the streetwise Ryuji, who takes a shine to Nami and decides to help her on her quest to avenge her father. Together they’ll comb through every seedy gambling den and lowlife ruffian of the Ginza underworld until Nami finally zeroes in on her prey.

Meiko Kaji is magnetic as the steely and righteous Nami, whose foray into Tokyo’s sordid back alleys is brought to life by Yamaguchi’s energetic direction in this electric spectacle of 1970s Japanese crime cinema.