俺は待ってるぜ (aka I Am Waiting) (1957)

What begins as a tenuous romance about two broken souls, an ex boxer (Yujiro Ishihara) who accidentally beat a man to death and a failed opera singer (Mie Kitahara) reduced to singing in dives, who meet on the waterfront late at night and take comfort in each other turns into a tale of revenge. Directed by Koreyoshi Kurahara (in his directorial film debut), this B&W slice of film noir is best in the quiet scenes as these two lost psyches attempt to heal each other's souls. There's a sweetness to the tentative relationship that's lost when Kurahara gets to the action sequences which aren't particularly well done. Still, this odd little mixture of romanticism and violence is strangely compelling and genuinely touching. With Hideaki Nitani and Isamu Kosugi.