Japan’s Losing Battle Against ’Goldman Sachs With Guns’

Nov. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Hollywood has long fetishizedJapanese gangsters, with their full-body tattoos, missingpinkies and harems of buxom groupies. Ever since SydneyPollack’s “The Yakuza” in 1974, the colorful mafiosi haveprovided regular fodder for directors including Ridley Scott andQuentin Tarantino.

Curiously, studios are again abuzz with a flurry ofJapanese mob projects. Warner Bros. is developing “TheOutsider,” about an American prisoner of war who joins theyakuza after World War II. Robert Whiting’s 1999 book “TokyoUnderworld,” which has gotten nibbles from Martin Scorsese, isbeing made into a U.S. cable-television series. Perhaps mosttimely of all, Jake Adelstein’s 2010 memoir, “Tokyo Vice,” iscoming to the big screen, starring Daniel Radcliffe of “HarryPotter” fame.