Safari 5000 (Kanji: 栄光への5000キロ; Eiko e no 5,000 kiro, which translates to 5000 Miles to Glory) is a 1969 Japanese racing film directed by Koreyoshi Kurahara and starring Yujiro Ishihara.
In the world of international car racing, the "Gypsy Team" headed by disgraced Japanese racer Takayuki Godai is travelling in Europe with his best friend and spotter, Pierre Leduc (Jean-Claude Drouot), his wife Anna (Emanuelle Riva), mechanic Juma Kingory (Robert A. Kinara), and his lover, ex-fashion designer Yuko Sasaki (Ruriko Asaoka). Godai enters the Monte Carlo Rally, but due to his bullheadedness loses the race when his car spins out of control and crashes. During his recovery, the team breaks up with Pierre going over to the British-owned UAC racing team.
However, Nissan Motors Managing Director Yuichiro Takase (Toshiro Mifune) takes an interest in Godai and offers him an opportunity to race for Nissan in the upcoming Japan Grand Prix. Godai accepts the offer and makes a stunning comeback, only to lose to Pierre, now UAC's top driver. With this defeat, Godai decides to race against Pierre again - this time in the dreaded cross-country East African Rally, over 5000 kilometers of dangerous East African savanna and jungle.
Loosely based on the story of the Nissan Motors Racing team during the actual 1966 East African Rally, the film features many of the plot developments seen in 1966's Grand Prix with Godai's racing life intertwined with his personal life and the rivalries between racing team sponsors.
A massive international production featuring some real footage shot on location at the actual races, the film was the number one Japanese film of 1969, but was soon lost to history due to legal entanglements. Thankfully, in 2012 the film was restored and re-released on Japanese theatres for a limited time, before being made available on BluRay the next year.
This work features examples of...
- A Winner Is You: At the end of the film, Godai wins the race, celebrates, makes peace with Pierre, and shares a brief staredown with Yuko. However, the film then cuts to shots of the cars that were wrecked in the race as a brief text epilogue lists the statistics for the race before it ends.
- Artistic License – History: Nissan didn't win the 1969 East African Grand Prix, but a few teams have won driving cars made by Nissan proper or under their export brand, Datsun.
- Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: Almost every scene involving Anna and Yuko sees them listening to the race's results over the radio and a spot of tea.
- Badass Driver: Being a racing movie, it's a given that most of the cast is this. The credits even list actual Nissan drivers as the stunt crew.
- Breaking the Fellowship: The opening of the movie is about this as Godai and Yuko return to Japan, Pierre and Anna go over to UAC, and Juma goes home to Kenya.
- Cool Car: Another given, and Nissan's racing cars are given a significant amount of screentime in the first half of the film.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Downplayed. The UAC Motors team owners are not above using underhanded tactics to win the races, but beyond this, we don't see much corruption or actual illegal deeds on their end.
- Defeat Means Friendship: Rather, "defeat means rekindling of friendship". At the conclusion of the Rally, Godai defeats Pierre in the last leg of the race, but Pierre shrugs it off and makes peace with Godai.
- Destroy the Product Placement: Given the brutal nature of rally races, all of the cars featured take various amounts of punishment, ranging from broken machinery to shattered windshields.
- Frontline General: A variation; during the Japan Grand Prix, both the UAC owners and Takase are in the pits to help guide their drivers.
- Friendly Enemy: Despite their acrimonious split, Godai and Pierre maintain a polite and fairweather relationship. Anna and Yuko even have tea while following the races from the sidelines.
- Game-Breaking Injury: Most of the cars in the race are damaged so badly, that more than half of the original cars break down before the end of the first leg of the race. Most of the survivors don't even make it to the end, including Pierre, who by then had a lead over Godai.
- Gratuitous English: Surprisingly for a Japanese film, a good chunk of the movie's dialogue is in either English or French, thanks to the international cast.
- Handicapped Badass: Takeuchi Masaomi, Nissan's head of Special Projects, has lost most of the fingers on his right hand. This doesn't stop him from helping Godai during the races.
- Honor Before Reason: Pierre is obsessed with defeating Godai during their races, even more than actually winning.
- Hypercompetent Sidekick: Juma and the Nissan Motors pit crews. Juma acts as Godai's spotter during the third race while the pit crew have to make the same journey and follow Godai over the rough jungle terrain.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The Gypsy Crew, for at least the first twenty or so minutes of the movie.
- Token Minority: Godai's mechanic and spotter (after Pierre leaves), Juma.
- That One Level: Both In-Universe and in Real Life. The East Africa Rally is considered to be one of, if not the most brutal rally races in the world. It's been described as specifically designed to stretch the drivers and the cars to their breaking points, and most of the cars involved don't even get to cross the finish line. This is all hammered in by the fact that if a car drops out of the race, it's only designated as ''retired.''
- The Film of the Book: Based on a book by Gozo Kasahara, Nissan Motors team manager during the 1966 East African Rally (and the winner of that year's award for best team).
- Transatlantic Equivalent: Arguably this to 1966's Grand Prix.
- Underdogs Never Lose: Godai wins the East African Rally despite starting in 90th place.
