Kurosawa's self-acknowledged breakthrough feature, and his first with longtime leading man Mifune, "Angel"” settles on the unlikely relationship between a grumpy, dissolute doctor and the self-destructive criminal who first resists and then comes to respect him, provoking conflict with yakuza boss Okada (Reisaburo Yamamoto). Mifune's screen presence is as formidable and energetic here as it would be in all the subsequent features he made with Kurosawa, whose milder temper was the perfect counterweight to the actor's glorious excesses.