The FableMovies like The Fable
- Key Features:
- Yakuza, Hitman, Fish out of water, Adaptation, Undercover, Action comedy, Criminal underworld, Violence-moderate
- Tone:
- humorous, stylized
- Target Audience:
- Action comedy fans, Crime movie enthusiasts, Fans of Japanese cinema, Viewers seeking lighthearted entertainment
- Emotional Arc:
- Amusement → Excitement
The Fable

The Fable is a legendary yakuza hitman equal to none—but his boss orders him and his sultry associate to lay low and learn how to live a "normal life" in Osaka.
The Fable
Akira is the legendary killer known as the Fable. Following the order of his boss and due to being overworked, he lives peacefully with his partner, Yoko, as ordinary siblings. Akira still works part-time at design company Octopus with CEO Takoda and employee Misaki. CEO Takoda and Misaki are unaware of Akira's background as an assassin. Meanwhile, Utsubo is a representative for an NPO. But, Utsubo works with contract killer Suzuki to set people up for extortion purposes. They target someone at design company Octopus.

A failed actor switches identities with a stranger at a bath house thinking it is his way out of his life of misery but only to find himself filling the shoes of an elite assassin.

After botching his latest assignment, a third-ranked Japanese hit man becomes the target of another assassin.

A Japanese assassin stranded in Taiwan must take work from a local crime boss to make ends meet when suddenly a woman from his past delivers a son to him.

Tang Ren and Qin Feng travel to Japan to investigate the death of a mafia head. As they suspect foul play, they engage in a battle of wits against foreign detectives.

Ryuzo and his 7 former henchmen are all retired yakuza, but they now live as regular old men. One day, Ryuzo becomes the victim of a phishing fraud. He calls his 7 men together to reform their society.

In dreamlike mountain scenery, Toshiko makes a daring escape from her sexually warped Uncle Sonezaki. Fortunately, she met Samehada as she runs for her life, which is also escaping from some slayers. What follows is a wild chase that leads the audience into a comically violent world.

With a price on his head, Ichi seeks tranquillity in a favorite village. Since his last visit, it has fallen prey to Boss Masagoro, the son of a merchant rumored to have stolen gold from the shogunate. The boss has hired Yojimbo as his hard-drinking enforcer, but Yojimbo is both a spy for the shogunate, trying to find the gold, and in love with the merchant's unwilling mistress, Umeno. Ichi hires on as the merchant's masseur and buys Umeno's freedom with his employer's own money. This embarrasses Yojimbo who withdraws from a pact with Ichi to stir up trouble between father and son and their gangs. As the two sides fight, Ichi finds the gold and sets up a final set of confrontations.

After yakuza boss Kurata dissolves his own criminal empire, a rival kingpin offers a position to Kurata's top operative, Tetsuya "Phoenix Tetsu" Hondo. When the fiercely loyal Tetsu declines, Otsuka taps unstoppable Tatsuzo the "Viper", a ruthless gun-for-hire, to assassinate him. As the Viper trails his target through the countryside, the agile Phoenix Tetsu grows concerned that one of his former associates has betrayed him.

Five men plot to steal a large sum of money from the local yakuza, but everything does not go as planned and the men find themselves hunted down by contract killers.

Five years after the all-out war between the Sanno and Hanabishi crime families, former yakuza boss Otomo works in South Korea for Mr. Chang, a noted fixer. When tensions rise between Chang and the Hanabishi, and Chang's life is endangered, Otomo returns to Japan to settle things once and for all.

Financially troubled, a newbie hitman reluctantly takes the job of finding the plotted killer of a Japanese tycoon.

Ogami Itto volunteers to be tortured by Yakuza in order to save a prostitute and is hired by their leader to kill an evil chamberlain.

Long is a Taiwanese killer known for his sword skills. After Long fails a Tokyo mission, he moves to a small town where no one knows about him.

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.

Sami, Tacchini, Yaya and Kader are four small-time crooks from the suburbs of Paris. After a failed robbery, their boss, Carlito, sends them to Canada to spy on his fiancée. There, they are mistaken for a band of professional killers and are hired to assassinate the heiress Léonore de Segonzac...

When a tough yakuza gangster is betrayed by his bosses, it means all out war. Bodies pile up as he takes out everyone in his way to the top in a brutal quest for revenge.

Minami mistakenly kills a gangster associate of his named Brother. Almost as soon as the murder takes place, the body of the deceased man is gone, prompting Minami to conduct a search. While looking, he finds a mysterious isolated hotel where he decides to take a rest. Not only are the front desk clerks a bit strange, but even the ambiance feels unusual. Minami soon realizes he may have gotten more than he bargained for.

A Japanese Yakuza gangster's deadly existence in his homeland gets him exiled to Los Angeles, where he is taken in by his little brother and his brother's gang.

After arriving in the town of Shimonita, Ichi finds that a price has been put on his head by a local yakuza boss. He's drawn into a trap, but after hearing of the slaying of a former love, Ichi furiously fights his way through the entire clan to face the killer, a hired ronin.

Framed for his family's murder and left for dead, an ex-hitman will stop at nothing to exact revenge on the masked "demons" who have taken over his city.

Paul Racine, a high-powered American business executive in Japan, is catapulted into a maze of danger and intrigue after he and his sexy companion are the targets of assassins hired by the ruthless Kinjo. To survive, Racine must join forces with a powerful samurai and together they will fight the force of evil in an awesome battle rooted in centuries of brutal conflict.

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.

An exceptional marksman and hopeless playboy, private eye Ryo Saeba reluctantly forms an alliance with his late partner's sister to investigate his death.

The Batman family has returned to the present to discover that Japan has disappeared, and a giant island - Hinomoto - is now in the sky over Gotham City. At the top sit the Yakuza, a group of superpowered individuals who reign without honor or humanity and look suspiciously like the Justice League. Now, it’s up to Batman and his allies to save Gotham!

Two high school girls who are about to graduate also happen to be highly-skilled assassins. When the organization they work for orders them to share a room, their relationship quickly sours. But when they become targets of the yakuza, the girls realize they'll have to work together to survive.

A nameless ronin, or samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival businessmen are struggling for control of the local gambling trade. Taking the name Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the ronin convinces both silk merchant Tazaemon and sake merchant Tokuemon to hire him as a personal bodyguard, then artfully sets in motion a full-scale gang war between the two ambitious and unscrupulous men.

A Korean man in China takes an assassination job in South Korea to make money and find his missing wife. But when the job is botched, he is forced to go on the run from the police and the gangsters who paid him.

Murakawa, an aging Tokyo yakuza tiring of gangster life, is sent by his boss to Okinawa along with a few of his henchmen to help end a gang war, supposedly as mediators between two warring clans. He finds that the dispute between the clans is insignificant and whilst wondering why he was sent to Okinawa at all, his group is attacked in an ambush. The survivors flee and make a decision to lay low at the beach while they await further instructions.

Beleaguered police detective Nishi takes desperate measures to try and set things right in a world gone wrong. With his wife suffering from leukemia and his business partner paralyzed from a brutal gangster attack, Nishi borrows from a yakuza loan shark and then robs a bank to clear his debt.

In Brazil, Akemi finds out that she's the heiress to the Yakuza empire. Just after that, her destiny enters a spiral of violence and mystery, where a gaijin (foreigner) who's been protecting her all this time, Shirô, may have been actually sent to kill her.

Two penniless orphans, Black and White, struggle to survive on the mean streets of Treasure Town. When a megacorporation threatens to tear down the town to build an amusement park, Black and White engage in the fight of their life.

A failing webtoon artist finds he's drawn a target on his own back after publishing a story containing real secrets from his former life as a superspy.

In 1868, after the Bakumatsu war ends, the ex-assassin Kenshin Himura traverses Japan with an inverted sword, to defend the needy without killing.

Former yakuza underling Kazuma Kiryū has recently been released from prison after a lengthy incarceration and is trying to piece his life together and distance himself from his yakuza past. Unfortunately, Kiryū's problems slowly escalate as he is pursued by a former associate, the baseball-bat-wielding psycho Gorō Majima, who has a grudge to settle with Kiryū.

Sawa, orphaned as a child by murderous thugs, now targets the scourge of society as a trained killer for a mercenary syndicate. Coquettish and capable of unimaginable violence, she's grown into the perfect weapon — but doubt takes hold in Sawa's mind when her fellow assassin, Oburi, decides he wants out.

A barkeeper saves a Yakuza boss' life and thus makes his way up in the organization. However, his fear of nothing soon causes problems.

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.

In Japan, gonzo filmmakers hatch a three-pronged plan to save an actress's career, end a yakuza war and make a hit movie.

As sadomasochistic yakuza enforcer Kakihara searches for his missing boss he comes across Ichi, a repressed and psychotic killer who may be able to inflict levels of pain that Kakihara has only dreamed of.

When top hitman Joe Flood is diagnosed with a terminal illness, he decides to take matters into his own hands – by taking a hit out on himself. But when the very hitmen he hired also target his ex-girlfriend, he must fend off an army of assassin colleagues and win back the love of his life before it's too late.

Nishi is a loser who has a crush on his childhood girlfriend. After an encounter with the Japanese mafia, he journeys to heaven and back, and ends up trapped in an even more unlikely place.

A high-school girl inherits a declining yakuza organization, which seeks to repair its fortunes under her leadership.

A seemingly unremarkable man called “Mouse” is caught by the police. In exchange for his freedom, he goes undercover, infiltrates a drug ring, and arranges a fake deal, but an unexpected turn of events occurs.

The Straw Hats visit a recreational island, run by Baron Omatsuri, who asks them to complete a series of ordeals if they wish to stay on the island. Luffy accepts and the Straw Hats work together to complete them, but as the island's mysteries unfold, their lives and friendships are put to the test. It's up to Luffy to stop the Baron's plot and keep his crew together.

A pair of down-on-their-luck swordsmen arrive in a dusty, windblown town, where they become involved in a local clan dispute. One, previously a farmer, longs to become a noble samurai. The other, a former samurai haunted by his past, prefers living anonymously with gangsters. But when both men discover the wrongdoings of the nefarious clan leader, they side with a band of rebels who are under siege at a remote mountain cabin.

After being brutally murdered in a gangster-style execution, Kensuke Hagane finds himself brought back to life by a mad scientist and rebuilt as a robot-human hybrid with a serious thirst for vengeance and the tools to carry it out.

The Accident Man is back, and this time he must best the top assassins in the world to protect the ungrateful son of a mafia boss, save the life of his only friend and rekindle his relationship with his maniacal father figure.

When easy-going Aoyagi meets an old friend for a fishing trip, he ends up drugged, framed for the Prime Minister's assassination, and on the run from corrupt cops. It's only the beginning of what quickly becomes the worst, weirdest day of his life. But he'll get by with a little help from his friends, who include a famous pop diva, a rockabilly deliveryman, a crippled old gangster, and the world's most cheerful serial killer.

After surviving an attempt on his life by his former partner, officer Cliff Garrett (Norris) exacts revenge on those who wronged him by going undercover as a hit man. He works to gain the reputation and trust needed in order to be accepted by the burgeoning Seattle-area criminal underworld, but it is all done in order to take it down from within.

Mob assassin Jeffrey is no ordinary hired gun; the best in his business, he views his chosen profession as a calling rather than simply a job. So, when beautiful nightclub chanteuse Jennie is blinded in the crossfire of his most recent hit, Jeffrey chooses to retire after one last job to pay for his unintended victim's sight-restoring operation. But when Jeffrey is double-crossed, he reluctantly joins forces with a rogue policeman to make things right.

Lupin is framed for the murder of Inspector Zenigata by a mysterious assailant holding a silver-coloured Walther P38 pistol Lupin himself once owned. Tracking the true killer leads Lupin to the island of the bloodthirsty Tarantula assassins inside the Devil’s Triangle. After joining the spider-tattooed army against their will, Lupin and his gang make both new friends and enemies as they not only plan to take home the Tarantulas’ massive gold repository for themselves, but hunt down the shooter from Lupin’s past. Can Lupin put to rest this demon who haunts his memories with the Walther P38?

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.

Cosmo, an affectless mob bookie who lives in the basement of a retirement home, is promoted to hitman. He learns his new trade from Steve, a seasoned killer. He falls in love with a yoga teacher, Jasmine, and must figure out a way to leave the mob so they can be together.

Blind traveler Zatoichi is a master swordsman and a masseur with a fondness for gambling on dice games. When he arrives in a village torn apart by warring gangs, he sets out to protect the townspeople.

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.

A detective breaks all rules of ethical conduct while investigating a colleague’s involvement in drug pushing and Yakuza activities.

An ex-special forces operative takes a job to provide security for a journalist as she interviews a dictator, but a military coup breaks out in the middle of the interview, they are forced to escape into the jungle where they must survive.

Milo is a professional hit man living on the edge. When failing to fulfill a contract for the first time, he escapes the city to avoid the wrath of his employers. Hiding out in a remote rural village, the locals mistake him for the new baker.

Ichi travels to the village of Itakura to pay his respects at the grave of Kichizo, a man he killed two years ago. When some tax money is stolen while in transit to the governor he is accused and sets out to find the money and clear his name.

Indestructible to his enemies and irresistible to women, the professional assassin codenamed Golgo 13 is shrouded in mystery and anonymity. If you're on his hit list, you're already dead. Always hired on his reputation alone, Golgo never breaks a contract. Can he survive the combined forces of the FBI, CIA, the Pentagon and the U.S. Army? Has the nameless agent finally met his match against the superhuman powers of the Snake and the twin evils of the psychopathic mercenaries, Gold and Silver?

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.

A former American G.I. joins a yakuza family after his release from prison in post-World War II Osaka.

The story follows a Roman architect named Lucius, who is having trouble coming up with ideas. One day, he discovers a hidden tunnel underneath a spa that leads him to a modern Japanese bath house. Inspired by the innovations found there, he creates his own spa, Roma Thermae, bringing in the modern ideas to his time.

An officially "dead" cop is trained to become an extraordinary unique assassin in service of the U.S. President.

A lethal assassin for a secret Chinese organisation, who sheds tears of regret each time he kills, is seen swiftly and mercilessly executing three Yakuza gangsters by a beautiful artist. She is captivated by the grace of his kill and later falls in love with him. An intense power struggle for the leadership of the Yakuza Clans ensues as they seek vengeance for the death of their leader.

While drying out on the West Coast, an alcoholic hit man befriends a tart-tongued woman who might just come in handy when it's time for him to return to Buffalo and settle some old scores.

Five bizarre stories with no apparent connection to one another eventually become intertwined, resulting in surreal circumstances.

The life of Danny Wright, a salesman forever on the road, veers into dangerous and surreal territory when he wanders into a Mexican bar and meets a mysterious stranger, Julian, who's very likely a hit man. Their meeting sets off a chain of events that will change their lives forever, as Wright is suddenly thrust into a far-from-mundane existence that he takes to surprisingly well … once he gets acclimated to it.

A legendary secret service agent comes out of hiding and returns to France to help the son he's never met get out of trouble.

Affable hit man Melvin Smiley is constantly being scammed by his cutthroat colleagues in the life-ending business. So, when he and his fellow assassins kidnap the daughter of an electronics mogul, it's naturally Melvin who takes the fall when their prime score turns sour. That's because the girl is the goddaughter of the gang's ruthless crime boss. But, even while dodging bullets, Melvin has to keep his real job secret from his unsuspecting fiancée, Pam.

A warrior-in-training and his bumbling friends go in pursuit of a stolen sword.

A bravado period action film set at the end of Japan's feudal era in which a group of unemployed samurai are enlisted to bring down a sadistic lord and prevent him from ascending to the throne and plunging the country into a war-torn future.

Driven by the desire for the huge reward, Tang Ren tricked Qin Feng to New York, to attend the World Detective Contest. Later on, behind the crazy competition, Qin and Tang discovered the real hidden facts of this contest.

In real life, Kwon Yoo is unemployed, but in the virtual game world he is the best leader. Kwon Yoo is then framed for a murder. With the help of hacker Yeo-wool, he tries to uncover the truth behind the murder case.

When young protege Akira Kageyama is bitten by his dying vampire boss, Genyo Kamiura, he must get used to his new powers before seeking revenge.

A gang lord hires Kamimura, a hit man, to take out a rival boss who's gotten greedy.

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.

Hakim, 35, a friendly neighborhood cop, must infiltrate the Portuguese community for the purpose of an investigation. But can one become Portuguese in three days? Especially when we know that Hakim is a walking disaster at undercover operations. His clumsiness and bad luck turn his many infiltrations into cataclysms. The case is clearly too big for him. Quickly trapped between his feelings and his mission, Hakim, who lives alone with his mother, will discover a community, but also a family.

Nicky Larson is tasked to recover the perfume of Cupid, a perfume that would make anyone who uses it irresistible.

A yakuza boss hires Goemon Ishikawa, a modern day samurai, to protect him aboard his cruise ship casino. Everything goes sideways when the famous thief, Lupin the Third, tries to rob the vessel. Lupin's being hunted by a powerful and mysterious man: the so called “Ghost of Bermuda.” With Goemon's employer dead in the ensuing chaos, his honor is at stake, and the only way to preserve it is with blood. But this opponent is like no other, and to make things right, Goemon may need to sharpen not only his sword, but himself as well!

Bent on revenge, a traumatized ex-police officer must infiltrate a yakuza organization by befriending one of the group's most unhinged members.

In an era where aliens have invaded and taken over feudal Tokyo, a young samurai finds work however he can.

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.

A woman who has recently discovered that she is the daughter of Angelo, a major mafia boss, decides to wreak vengeance when he is killed by a hitman. She's aided by his faithful bodyguard, with whom she soon falls in love.

Shozo Hirono has managed to separate from the Yamamori family and create his own small family, and extend his circle of acquaintances. These new friendships include a powerful underboss of the Muraoka family, Noboru Uchimoto.

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.

A hitman finds himself embroiled in the middle of a Mafia war between the Sicilians and the Calabrians.

In Chinatown, law and order is turned upside down when a trio of feral Chinese gangsters arrive, start terrorizing civilians, and usurping territory. The beleaguered local gangsters team up with the police, lead by the badass loose cannon Ma Seok-do, to bring them down. Based on a true story.

Rıfkı, who lives in Germany, returns to his village, which he left years ago, to sell the properties inherited from his late father. A few coincidences that occur upon his arrival in the village lead to his name being associated with the 'Saint' title.

Haru, an orphaned American who washes ashore in Japan and is mistaken for the great White Ninja of legend. Raised among the finest Ninjas, Haru grows strong and big - very big. With the grace of all Three Stooges rolled into one body, Haru is an embarrassment to his clan. But when a beautiful blonde pleads for his help, Haru is given one dangerous, disastrously funny chance to prove himself.

After spending a decade in prison, a hitman learns that he has a daughter and just wants a chance at a normal life. But his former mob boss wants him back at any cost, sending merciless assassins after him.

A multicultural band of acrobatic do-gooders take on gangsters of three great nations in this action-packed sequel to the French box-office smash Yamakasi. The Yamakasi are a team of crime fighters who can scale buildings and urban towers with the ease of a fly walking up the wall; after leaving their home base in Paris to set up operations in England, the men decide to set up a satellite facility

Shamoto runs a small tropical fish shop. When his daughter Mitsuko is caught shoplifting at a grocery store a man named Murata steps in to settle things between the girl and the store manager. Murata also runs a tropical fish shop and he and Shamoto soon become friendly. However Murata hides many dark secrets behind his friendly face.

A mob hitman wants to retire, but his bosses don't think that's a good idea. Complications - and many bloody shootouts - ensue.

When a private eye, a jilted bride and a mysterious stranger join forces to track down an elusive mobster, there's more than trouble in the air.

Ogami Itto is challenged by a quintet of warriors, each armed with one fifth of Ogami's assassin fee and one fifth of the information he needs to complete his assignment.

In a world with no guns, a mysterious drifter, a bartender and a young samurai plot revenge against a ruthless leader and his army of thugs, headed by nine diverse and deadly assassins.

