A prostitute and her stepfather are falsely accused of murder, imprisoned, sexually abused and tortured. The real murderer will be discovered - and the girl will take revenge.
Taking its title from an archaic Japanese word meaning "ghost story," this anthology adapts four folk tales. A penniless samurai marries for money with tragic results. A man stranded in a blizzard is saved by Yuki the Snow Maiden, but his rescue comes at a cost. Blind musician Hoichi is forced to perform for an audience of ghosts. An author relates the story of a samurai who sees another warrior's reflection in his teacup.
A nuclear explosion in the far north unleashes Gamera, the legendary flying turtle, from his sleep under the ice. In his search for energy, Gamera wreaks havoc over the entire world, and it's up to the scientists, assisted by a young boy with a strange sympathic link to the monster, to put a stop to Gamera's rampage.
Zatoichi comes upon a dying man who asks him to give a bag of money to "Taichi". Zatoichi has no idea who this is but when he comes upon a small town harassed by gangsters, he finds that "Taichi" was the man's young son. Along his travels he also met a blind monk who makes Zatoichi question his murderous lifestyle. In trying to help the town, Zatoichi kills some gangsters and becomes a hero to the boy. He must make a choice of whether to use non-violence and set a good example, or violence and set the boy on the wrong path in life.
Ever since an accident in the mountains outside town, Takuji's slept in a coma; his neighbors care for him as new events occur every day.
The action takes place in a city where you can live on only 100 yen a day. The "General", who indulged in gambling with his henchmen all day, he was running his business and hitting him with a taxi turned out to be a trifle for him. A unique work, filled with tears and laughter, praising the beautiful human love that blooms at the bottom of life, focused on the genius “General” who lives in the troubled city of Kamagasaki.
A young doctor falls into a despair of developments. He plans to revenge the disgrace inflicted upon his sister, whose engagement was broken as a result.
In Burma during the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier separated from his unit disguises himself as a Buddhist monk to escape imprisonment as a POW.
A Yokohama shoe executive faces a wrenching choice when kidnappers mistakenly seize his chauffeur’s son but demand the ransom anyway.
In Edo Japan, a kabuki actor seeks revenge against the three men who drove his parents to their deaths years ago.
1962 Japanese movie
Ishihara Kiyoshi plans to marry the woman he loves, Chiee, a coffee shop girl. After an accident, Chiee loses her memory. A romance movie whose original work by Ayako Sono was made into a melodrama by a combination of Shinoda Masahiro and Terayama Shuji.
1962 Japanese movie
Subu makes pornographic films. He sees nothing wrong with it. They are an aid to a repressed society, and he uses the money to support his landlady, Haru, and her family. From time to time, Haru shares her bed with Subu, though she believes her dead husband, reincarnated as a carp, disapproves. Director Shohei Imamura has always delighted in the kinky exploits of lowlifes, and in this 1966 classic, he finds subversive humor in the bizarre dynamics of Haru, her Oedipal son, and her daughter, the true object of her pornographer-boyfriend’s obsession. Imamura’s comic treatment of such taboos as voyeurism and incest sparked controversy when the film was released, but The Pornographers has outlasted its critics, and now seems frankly ahead of its time.
South of Tokyo is a small island until quite recently relatively unchanged since feudal times. Now, however, it is being made into a tourist's playland and the girls, who had been abalone divers, now become geisha, and the old ways of the island are all topsy-turvy. One of the girls, more sensitive than the rest, sees that here, too, people are motivated only by greed and decides to leave and try to find a better life elsewhere.
Senko Tamagawa is a third-year junior high school student, and she is the captain of the badminton club. Her father, Kinzo, remodeled her barn and lent it to her only Mikayo. Senko was somehow envious of her flashy life... In a tragedy with a girl living in the base as the main character, Katsumi Miki of "Life like a weed" adapted the original story of Muraji Uchiki and directed by Eisuke Takizawa of "Ajisai no Uta".
Years of warfare end in a Japan unified under the Tokugawa shogunate, and samurai spy Sasuke Sarutobi, tired of conflict, longs for peace. When a high-ranking spy named Tatewaki Koriyama defects from the shogun to a rival clan, however, the world of swordsmen is thrown into turmoil. After Sasuke is unwittingly drawn into the conflict, he tracks Tatewaki, while a mysterious, white-hooded figure seems to hunt them both. By tale’s end, no one is who they seemed to be, and the truth is far more personal than anyone suspected. Director Masahiro Shinoda’s Samurai Spy, filled with clan intrigue, ninja spies, and multiple double crosses, marks a bold stylistic departure from swordplay film convention.
Jack Elliot, a one-time MVP for the New York Yankees is now on the down side of his baseball career. With a falling batting average, does he have one good year left and can the manager of the Chunichi Dragons, a Japanese Central baseball league find it in him?
Film by director Kenji Misumi
Nitani is an undercover drug enforcement agent in Kobe who not only busts two rival drug gangs but also helps one of the more decent hoodlums find the killer of the hood's brother.
A greedy developer, in league with a corrupt Shrine Magistrate, brutally tries to drive people out of a tenement building and destroy the shrine in back. But he makes the fatal mistake of hosting a 100 Ghost Stories ceremony without the closing cleansing ritual, opening the door for the Yokai Monsters to punish the wicked.
A man is wrongfully accused of murder.
Koreyoshi Kurahara's ingeniously plotted, pocket-size noir concerns the intertwined fates of a desperate bank manager, blackmailed for book-cooking, and his resentful but timid underling, passed over for a promotion. The marvelously moody Intimidation is an elegantly stripped-down and carefully paced crime drama.
The myth of the Sun Goddess who founded Japanese society is seen through the lens of a modern view of history.
Learning of his family's collapse, acolyte Goichi, sent to study silently at the Temple of the Golden Pavilion, must endure acute psychological distress.
A harsh young man seduces a freeloading young woman and eventually takes advantage of her knack for hitchhiking to rob middle-class men.
Set in 1926 when Japanese tradition was much stronger, this drama looks at the inner workings of a small family, especially the relationship between a sister and brother.
Ushimatsu's father told him never to reveal his lower-caste heritage; years later, he now contemplates confiding in an activist fighting against such discrimination.
At the beginning of the Showa era, a man who was captivated by a girl he saw through a telescope locked her in a "painting". Visualization based on Rampo's "Oshie and Traveling Man". Released in 1994 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Rampo's birth.
Tateo, young and neurotic, wishes to leave the village his mother has raised him in.
Two infantry regiments of the Imperial Japanese Army—210 men overall—tackled Mt. Hakkoda in the winter of 1902 to prepare for war with Russia.
A young female samurai comes upon a dying messenger and agrees to deliver the scroll he was carrying to its destination. However, unbeknownst to her, the scroll is actually a formula for a new kind of gunpowder. An evil clan that is planning to overthrow the Emperor is also after the scroll, and they try to take it from her.
The sexual experiences of the passionate Sakiko, from her fling with her boss in her first job to her ending up as a prostitute.
The tragic story of Gonza, a handsome ladies man, set in the Tokugawa Period, a time in which appearances are very important. Gonza competes with Bannojō for the honor to perform the tea ceremony to celebrate the birth of an heir to the lord of their clan. To see the sacred tea scrolls Gonza promises to marry the daughter of the family which possesses them, even though he is unofficially engaged to another. When studying the scrolls with Osai, the mother of the house, Bannojō sneaks into the house and steals their obis and runs through the town proclaiming the two as adulterers.
A Tokyo family escaping the war relocates to a Hokkaido village; their daughter is set to marry the local leader's son, but her siblings disapprove.
At a seaside city somewhere in the Tohoku area, the corpses of Nozomi, daughter of an affluent family, and Yamazaki, son of an engineer at the local nuclear power-plant, are found tied-to on a beach, as if they intended to commit double suicide. Nogami, a reporter, begins to investigate.
The days leading up to a toddler's second birthday are seen alternately from the child's point of view as well as that of his parents.
A blind traveling musician is abused and oppressed wherever she goes, even as the modern world imposes change around her.
Film about a car dealer who gets into financial trouble.
Sachiko's beloved sister Nobuko was supposed to go to Tohoku when she suddenly dies in a car accident in Hamamatsu. Sachiko begins to trace her sister's friendships to unravel the mystery of her mysterious death...
A female reporter is fired for writing about police corruption; to make money while hiding from the press, she posts a bounty upon herself.
A film about the substantial population of Koreans living in Japan, and the love affair between Kayako, a Japanese girl, and Im, a Korean.
The Taisho era was a time of turbulence in Japan. From new marks of modernity to full-blown riots, a sense of revolution filled the air. The Dam Dam Group is a small anarchist organization lead by Daijiro, a silver tongued "Benshi", a performer who provides narratives for silent films, playing multiple roles. In other words, he was a master at the art of deception, a handy talent when it came to 'doing jobs' for his group. His revolutionary ideals attracted many to his squadron, but among them was a young girl who was oblivious to his group's activities. Her name was Shino.
Akira and Hiroshi are two lowlives who work at a pachinko parlour. Hiroshi is a ladies' man but always loses at pachinko. Akira is a virgin at 25 but always wins. Hiroshi tries to get Akira laid with little success but things change when Akira is informed of a 88 million yen inheritance. But only if he can get married.
In Osaka's slum, capricious folks without futures engage in pilfering, assault and robbery, prostitution, and the trading of ID cards and blood.
1962 Japanese movie
Seven years ago, Ishimatsu Toshio, a talented radio producer at Zen Nihon Hōsō, witnessed a crazed drug addict murder his wife and then commit suicide, though Toshio was able to save the lives of their two children. Just transferred from Shimizu to Tokyo, Toshio hopes to produce a program that will expose the drug trade in Tokyo. One day, Toshio stops into a noodle shop where he is mistaken for a drug dealer and passed a bagful of drugs. The real dealer arrives in time to follow Toshio home. That night Toshio is attacked by the dealer, who turns out to be Kenji, one of the children Toshio had saved. Kenji can't bring himself to kill Toshio, so he runs away and goes into hiding from the mafia. While continuing to investigate the drug trade, Toshio searches for Kenji to get Kenji's testimony for his program.
Adaptation of Seicho Matsumoto's novel of the same name.
Hell manifests itself through the sins, shame and desires of an upper class rural family and a mother's grief from beyond the grave.
1962 Japanese movie
Kikuji is the scion of an Osaka merchant family whose traditional power is matrilineal. Instructed by his overbearing mother and grandmother to give them an heiress for the family business, he stands by helplessly as his wife is thrown out of the house for producing a son. Driven to a life of dissipation - his mistresses also fail to produce daughters - in the end he is just too tired to care.
Wakae is a 15 year old girl who lived under the same roof with her alcoholic father and stepmom. Her mother had died years ago. She spends her nights at a rundown bar, sharing drinks and cigarettes with the lowlife drunks. She has nowhere to turn and no one to talk to, until she is reunited with her childhood friend, Saburo, who brings warmth to her heart.
A young doctor discovers that the city hall of records has a record of his death. He and some friends try to seek out the person who reported it, and uncover a shady group of criminals with a sinister plot.
A Buddhist monk becomes ensnared by a seductive woman who, according to legend, transforms her lovers into beasts.
Nishina Saburouta is powerful but corrupted priest. One night, an old samurai who couldn't bear him any more, attempts to kill him, but without success. Saburouta is rescued by his niece, Keisuke at the last moment. Keisuke is a a good-for-nothing. Since that event, he always turns to his uncle when he needs money. Recently Keisuke feels his uncle isn't as generous as he used to be, he suspects that Saburouta has found out the illicit relation between Keisuke and his uncle's young mistress, Ohasu.
This is the first volume of a ghost story TV series presented by Nobuo Nakagawa, Saburo Endo and Teruo Ishii. Contains films 1 to 4 in the "Mysterious Thirteen Nights" series.
1962 Japanese movie
Takuya witnesses the homicide of the detective leading an investigation into the murder of the chairman of the People’s Economic Association, and he disguises himself.
A kindergarten teacher meets a novice magician and together they travel to another city to find love.
Japan, February 1868. As the Tokugawa shogunate declines and the power of Emperor Meiji grows, Gonzo, a soldier of the Restoration Army, returns to Sawando, his hometown, to announce the end of tyranny.
In the early Meiji era, two contrasting craftsmen, who had been bound by a ten-year strong friendship, suddenly hated each other and face many obstacles. Adapted from Shugoro Yamamoto novel.
A "hustler's hustler" (Takarada), works his way up the corporate ladder at a camera company. His biggest scheme involves winning the business of a foreign visitor by setting him up with a beautiful "model" (Tsukasa), actually a bar hostess, but the plan backfires when the would-be executive falls for the woman himself.
In this drama at the end of World War II, the inhabitants of a small Japanese fishing village must come to terms with their nation's defeat and the sudden occupation of General MacArthur and his troops.
A touching story following young shamisen string maker, Saku. Beautiful Saku moves to Lake Yogo, known for its production of quality shamisen strings, only to find her peaceful life turned upside down when a master musician takes personal interest in her.
Famous detective Kosuke Kindaichi follows a dying man's words to an enigmatic island, where he meets beautiful twin sisters and tragic events unfold.
Fourth film of "Mysterious Thirteen Nights" series.
A young dockworker who owes his life to his boss becomes embroiled in union activity on the Yokohama waterfront. The rebel Saburo works as an errand boy for a shipping company and vents his frustrations by plucking on the guitar.
A writer haunted by the death of his wife and threatened by the imagined infidelities of his lovers uses his affairs for the subjects of his novels.
George Mihara was ordered by his grandfather Tom to go to Japan. The purpose was to deliver a $100,000 check to Matsuyama, a Japanese soldier who had helped Tom around the time of World War I, and to perform some act of kindness in Japan using $300 pocket money. This was to test whether George was a suitable boy to inherit Tom's YES Ranch.
1961 Japanese movie
A dying businessman intends to will his fortune to his three illegitimate children, whose whereabouts are unknown, so a bevy of lawyers and associates scheme to take advantage of the situation.
One day, when Goro (Kiyoshi Atsumi) returns to his poor tenement house from a trip on a deep-sea tuna boat, his neighbor's daughter Haruko (Mitsuko Baisho) also returns from the juvenile classification center on the same day. However, at a welcome party held by Goro for Haruko, a drunk friend crashes into Haruko's house with a dump truck and is forced to leave. Goro plans to marry Haruko to a rich man and force her to pay dowry, but...
Based on the original novel by Tokuda Shusei, adapted by frequent Masumura scribe Kaneto Shindo, this downbeat melodrama features a battle of women for the affections and commitment of the same man, a handsome car salesman. Masuko is the number one hostess at a cabaret, living with her lover, ... but finds out that he has a wife. When Masuko’s niece arrives the competition further ratchets up.
Japanese horror move from 1978.
A group of five rookie insurance salespersons, driven to desperation by the impossibility of their work in Japan's failing postwar economy, form a plan to rob a cash delivery truck in order to provide for their families.
Three stories revolve around independence, a man searching for his wife, and a poor craftsman trying to make money.
A runaway cat-loving girl begins a love triangle with a reckless older man and a young biker in high school. The film follows their subsequent chaotic relationships.
Kaji is sent to the Japanese army labeled Red and is mistreated by the vets. Along his assignment, Kaji witnesses cruelties in the army and revolts against the abusive treatment against the recruit Obara. He also sees his friend Shinjô Ittôhei defecting to the Russian border, and he ends in the front to fight a lost battle against the Russian tanks division.
Japanese film based on the life of Zen Master Tetsugen Doko.
The Americans are swiftly closing on Okinawa, an island just south of the Japanese mainland. The Imperial command sends top generals and several army divisions to defend it at all costs. The mission quickly degenerates as vital resources and troops are diverted to other islands. After a civilian evacuation ends in tragedy most of non-combatants are forced to remain on the island. Many convert to soldier status. Tokyo sends mixed messages that squander time and resources, as when they order the defenders to build an airstrip for aircraft that never come. The truth soon becomes obvious: the high command decides that the island cannot be held and effectively abandons the Okinawan defenders. When the Americans land many troops are deployed in the wrong places. As the slaughter mounts, a suicidal attitude takes hold. Okinawa becomes a death trap, for civilian volunteers and non-combatants as well.
Based on the novel by Naoki Prize-nominated author Taro Takeshita, a thriller full of black humor. A jealous husband murders his adulterous wife, then embarks on a crusade to extort all the wealthy men whom she had affairs with.
Edo Crime Book: Black Claws
Kisuke, a young bamboo worker marries Tomoe, a geisha who was once involved with Kisuke's late father.
Shinko Terasawa was always considered to be the odd ball of the bunch. At a time when romance was against school regulations, Shinko was the first to take a bite out of the forbidden fruit. Expelled from her former school, she finds herself in an all-girls school in Jokamachi, where rumors fly. One day, Shinko delivers an anonymous love letter addressed to her English teacher, Ms. Shimazaki. Convinced that the students are playing a prank, Ms. Shimazaki is adamant about getting to the bottom of this "problem”.
In the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier afflicted with tuberculosis is abandoned by his company and left to wander the Philippine island of Leyte.
A middle-aged husband of a younger woman finds her youth intimidating to the point that he cannot become aroused. His solution involves the introduction of his daughter's lover to his wife.
It is early summer in the Nekushiro Plains of Hokkaido. A scientist, Ogata, who was dispatched to the same research institute, meets a 14-year-old girl, Maya, in a fog-shrouded forest. The two gradually become friends. However, one day, as the end of summer vacation approaches, Ogata's lover, Tomonori, comes to visit.
In post-war Japan, a publisher goes to visit her former teacher for help on a modern translation of a legend about a mummified Buddhist monk who was revived and who, centuries later, turned into a sex demon who terrorized a village in pre-modern Japan.
Film about the Ashio Copper Mine Incident and Shozo Tanaka.
Agent Jiro Kitami attempts to stop a smuggling ring from shipping arms to Vietcong guerrillas.
Drama about the friendship between a lonely laborer (Atsumi) and a young woman (Hoshi) unable to enter college.
Towards the end of WWII, a black American pilot is captured and imprisoned by rural Japanese villagers, who await official instructions as to how to proceed with their 'catch'.
Kaze is a philandering TV producer. His wife and nine of his mistresses conspire to kill him. However each woman would rather keep him alive, as long as she was the only woman in his life.
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.
Two outsiders start a relationship in a mining town.
In the summer of 1947, various men and women gather at a mansion in the countryside at the invitation of Kazuma Utagawa. They are artists, novelists, poets, painters, playwrights, actresses, etc. Then the murders begin, one after another. The incident seemed to have no continuity...
Nikkatsu finally responds to Suzuki's growing discontentment by giving him a bigger budget and a better script. This episodic collection of "real coast guard action stories" was the perfect vehicle for Koji Wada. Whatever negative press he had received for Tokyo Knights was quickly forgotten. He became the new "teen star." And Suzuki: "the director to watch."
When two sisters fall in love with the same man, one must decide to look elsewhere.
A touching story of a girl who sails away from her love to keep her family together.
Japanese drama film.
An investigation into a drug smuggler who is assassinated in front of an insurance building sets two detectives, Sumikawa and Akine, into a sprawling investigation through Tokyo's underworld.
About a girl who marries in the middle of the Pacific War, is widowed at 18, and her unflagging struggle to survive during and after the war with her son.
Minoru visits his home on Okinoerabu island for the first time in thirty years. Seeing the old man who used to be in love with his mother, Minoru recalls the old days spent on the island with his young, beautiful mother.
Machida (Shintaro Katsu) is in constant trouble because of his instincts to do right every time, even when it endangers his life. A gang hires him for his "forceful personality," and assigns him to kill evil people, a president of a loan company and a drug baron.
A story of a shopkeeper and his ex-wife, lives full of tragedy.
After surviving the slaughter of many Christians 350 years ago, a samurai denounces God for ignoring the pleas of believers. He sells his soul to Satan and receives the power to resurrect the dead to join him in a murderous rampage.
A reporter Takuo, who is sleeping in the newspaper room of the Maichō newspaper company, receives a sudden report from a reporter that the missing Akiyama JNR president was found dead.
The heir to a family fortune discovers that a curse has been placed on it, put there centuries before by a band of samurai warriors. Adaptation of novel by Seishi Yokomizo
Based on the novel by Osamu Dazai and distributed by ATG. The story of a young man who is caught between the breakup of the traditions of a northern Japanese aristocratic family and the impact of Western ideas. In consequence, he feels himself "disqualified from being human" (a literal translation of the Japanese title) and goes down the stairs to self-destruction step by step.
Ryoji, a wanderer, arrives in a remote mountain town, carrying a shotgun and claiming to be a hunter. He quickly becomes embroiled in a web of trouble surrounding the town's mill.
An outlaw pushes the residents of Edo's red light district to rebel against a growing number of stifling, moralistic laws.
Isazo is a traveling gambler and living legend in the world of yakuza, known for his swordsmanship and bravery, his impeccable manners, and his brilliant talent in gambling. One late fall at an inn in Kiso Fukushima, Isazo befriends a young boy whose mother turns out to be his old love Yoshino, with whom he was not unable to consummate a marriage due to the class differences between them.
A mountain man beheads his many wives to prove his love to an alluring woman he meets in an enchanted forest.
While in vacation in a sea side house, a young man fall in love with a beautiful woman who pretends to live by herself in the sea. The fishermen of a nearby village think she is a monster, the female of a shark killed many years before, responsible for many disappearances.
A youthful film depicting the sexual awakening of a boy who has just entered adolescence and his heartbreaking romance during the summer holidays with a young sprightly girl.
A fugitive christian "saint" (female, of course!) and a sadistic drug-addled princess both have their eye on Kyoshiro. The fact that a bunch of ruthless smugglers also want him dead is the least of his problems!
Nakata (Keiichiro Akagi) is a nihilistic young buck who is willing to do anything to get money in his pockets. As he knocks back a couple drinks that he knows he won't be able to afford, a former marksman-turned-bad, Ishioka approaches him. Ishioka is looking for an unaffiliated hit-man who is willing to handle some business. Nakata is just the right man for the job.
A police procedural surrounding murder at a bookstore and the private lives of the cops trying to solve the case.
A Tokyo newspaper reporter goes after the Japanese king of cocaine trafficking but he's tricked by a woman who works for the gangster and gets framed for a murder he didn't commit.
Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.
A treasury official passed over for promotion and obsessed with careerism interferes in the lives of his three sons, who seek escape from his relentless pressure in the mortal danger of mountain climbing.
A young man travels to Egypt and becomes embroiled in an independence movement by chance. Produced entirely on location overseas, which was groundbreaking at the time.
The Ginza Whirlwind (Akira Kobayashi) attempts to solve a murder.
Asada Keiko and Kurokawa Saburo are two young college students. When Keiko visits Saburo's house, she meets his father Kokichi and his mother Motoko. Motoko is a famous hair dresser, who openly flaunts her lover. When Kokichi and Motoko fight, which they do a lot, he routinely threatens to leave but never quite does. A relationship develops between Saburo and Keiko, but Saburo is shaken when his mother tells Keiko the truth about Saburo's past and the secret of his birth.
The mother of a feudal lord's only heir is kidnapped away from her husband by the lord. The husband and his samurai father must decide whether to accept the unjust decision, or risk death to get her back.
A young man goes missing after visiting his girlfriend's isolated country home. His sister and her boyfriend trace him to the creepy mansion, but their search becomes perilous when they uncover a gruesome family history.
Misawa Ihei (Nagato) is traveling with his wife Tae (Iwashita Shima) who abhors the practice of sword fighting for prize money. Tae is the daughter of the clan's chief counselor who married the low-ranking Ihei to avoid becoming the clan lord's mistress. Into the mix comes Oba Gunjuro (Tetsurō Tamba), a mysterious ronin who will do anything for money. This leads to a fitting climax as the forces of hate and love converge while the couple attempt to break through the border!
Following a yearlong attendance upon his shogun in Edo, samurai Hikokuro makes a long-awaited return to his home and doting wife, Dane. Initially greeted by the effusive welcome of his family, spiteful whispers also reach his ear about an adulterous affair carried on, in his long absence, between his wife and a famous drummer. With Hikokuro’s honor imperiled by rumor, his family insists on a formal investigation into the veracity of the gossip. Through the combined testimony of many witnesses, a tale unwinds around the visits of a traveling musician hired to tutor the family heir, the spurned attentions of the man who started the rumor, and the ultimate truth behind the accusations. The conclusion of events prove as much an indictment of bushidō as it is of the reluctant parties involved. Adapted from a 1706 play by Chikamatsu Monzaemon and based on a true case.
Set in Kawaguchi in the early 60s, this simple story chronicles the lives of foundry families and one girl's dreams of higher education.
Ide of the Kokusai Rayon Company visits a supermarket and finds cheap shirts being passed off as his company's products. But a closer look reveals that the last letter of "Kokusai" has been changed to "n" and reads "Kokusan." The buyers, however, are all under the impression that they are buying Kokusai shirts. Ide begins an investigation to find out where the shirts are being made, but before he is able to uncover anything, he is killed on a train and his little black book, filled with secret data, is stolen. Sugino then starts a one-man search for both the killer and the factory turning out the cheap shirts.
Based on the novel of the same name by Seichô Matsumoto.
A man sets out to search for his brother among the survivors of Hiroshima after an anonymous letter.
A hard working salaryman takes off five days from his busy job and sets off with his wife and two children to visit his parents in his hometown for the 1991 new year holidays. He decides that they will go by car to save on expenses. Unfortunately, the long drive from Tokyo to his hometown becomes a much longer journey than expected due to traffic, sickness and other misfortunes and by the time they arrive three days later, they only have time for a short but happy visit.
Kiroku boards with a Roman Catholic family and falls for the daughter Michiko. He ignores his feelings, joins a gang, gets in fights and, eventually, becomes involved with the radical Kita Ikki group.
Film from 1967.
Young female teacher Kyoko Miyake relocates to a small seaside town with her runaway little sister, but their new life is complicated by hoodlum-like Jiro Yamazaki (the black sheep of the title) who is related to the family hosting them and whom they keep running into, but can't help but to feel sympathy for. Of course, rumours start fast in a small town, but delightfully she doesn't really care at all. This is another very solid Shogoro Nishimura film.
Chieko (Momoe Yamaguchi) has been raised as the only child of parents who run a dry goods store. When Chieko was a middle-school student, she learned that her parents are not her biological parents. Cheiko's mother told her that she was stolen while sleeping under a cherry tree in Gion, Kyoto, Japan, but Chieko doesn't believe that. Her relationship with her parents is very close. Chieko only tells her childhood friend Shinichi, but...
Mainly the story of Shinsuke and his stepmother, ranging from Shinsuke's infanthood to his mid-teens. Coal workers and the mines dominate nearly every aspect of the life of the characters. Shinsuke's father dies while bravely using dynamite to rescue a group of trapped Korean miners. Several older men attempt to help he and his mother cope, including a kind Korean and a Harley-riding yakuza.
A couple originally from Okinawa run an inexpensive restaurant in Kobe, with their grade-school daughter, Fuuchan. The movie depicts the warm interaction between her and adults that grew up with the rough history of Okinawa and discrimination from the mainland. Shots partly on location at beach of Itoman, Yogi Park and Hateruma Island. This is the movie version of the well-known novel by Kenjiro Haitani.
A semi-documentary story about the vicissitudes in the life of an elderly fisherman.
The story of a Japanese man who as a 16-year-old went to Maui to work in the sugar cane fields in order to support his family back in Japan. Now 89 and still living in Hawaii he is visited by his granddaughter who brings him a letter from his disinherited and recently dead son. This brings back memories of his life with his wife and family following the attack on Pearl Harbor, in particular of his son who had gone off to join the war for the Americans.
An opportunistic department store clerk gets involved with three women and attempts to manipulate them so he can move up the social ladder.
After winning big at the races, Torajiro Kuruma wants to take his aunt and uncle on a trip to Hawaii to partly pay the great filial debt he feels he owes them, but the plan hits a snag. Also, a pretty kindergarten teacher rents a room at Toraya.
Taking the Chilean coup as an example, a group of young officers plan to overthrow the Japanese government on V-J Day. They aim to abolish the post-war constitution, restore the national army and revive the traditional spirit of Japan. As the conspiracy is exposed, the coup squadrons are wiped out one by one. The remaining squadron takes over a night train bound for Tokyo.
This sensuously beautiful film chronicles the activities of four sisters who gather in Kyoto every year to view the cherry blossoms. It paints a vivid portrait of the pre-war lifestyle of the wealthy Makioka family from Osaka, and draws a parallel between their activities and the seasonal variations in Japan.
A story of Japanese writer Kafu Nagai (1879-1959), a man about sixty with a huge reputation of seducer who falls madly in love for a young geisha named Oyuki. Meticulous and smartly dressed, Nagai patiently wrote in his diary his thoughts during many years. A melancholy reflection on the passage of time and a brilliant interpretive exercise.
A documentary about the lives of actors in the Sakura-tai theatrical troupe, which had arrived in the island of Hiroshima to begin preparations for the staging of a play just before the atomic bombing.
When Sokichi stops providing his long-time lover Kikuyo enough money to pay for the care of their three young children, Kikuyo leaves the children with Sokichi - and his very surprised and angry wife Oume - and disappears.
Based on the novel by proletarian writer Sunao Tokunaga. The story is about a long strike by workers at a large printing house and the strikers' steadfastness, which neither hunger nor violence could break. The heroine of this story actively participates in her colleagues' struggle against layoffs, oppression, and police brutality.
Story of romance and rivalry between two ad agencies vying for the same account with a pharmaceutical firm.
A crippled kabuki player is taken into a strolling company of itinerant actors. An influential publisher notices his honest, bold drawings, and nurtures him despite persecution and betrayal. The film explores the eternal relationship between artist and producer, and describes the emanicipation of a man who refuses to let himself become the plaything of power and money.
When a lone traveler stumbles upon a remote, drought-stricken village, he finds himself engulfed in a whirlpool of myth, mystery, and magic: in a nearby pond reside spirits who hold the fate of the town’s inhabitants, including lovers Akira and Yuri, in their hands.
Shokichi, the owner of the clothing store, lives with his daughter Hideko and plans to open an art gallery. One day, Hideko led a handsome art student, Shohei and a poor painter, Sohei. Sohei’s painting was praised by a great printer at the completion ceremony of the art gallery. Since he became successful as a painter, but he looked quite indifferent. Around the same time, Shohei’s sister brought Sohei’s pictures to the gallery and Shokichi noticed that she was a daughter of his first love.
A poignant love story between a 29-year-old woman, who has once been a prostitute but is now the mistress of a wealthy jewelry merchant, and a 19-year-old college student.
Eric, an American, arrives at an international tourist hotel and loses his self-defense Colt. It was Kudaira, a beggar, who discovered it, and immediately sold it to Matsuko - another pauper. Soon, the weapon that moves from hand to hand, becomes a tool of many crimes.
Two detectives are tasked to investigate the murder of an old man, found bludgeoned to death in a Tokyo rail yard.
A three parts movie following people forgotten by a society that modernizes at the price of expelling part of its individuals.
In the backstreets of Ginza, the boss of a hairdressing salon is found dead, killed by strangulation. The detective on the case soon hears rumors about the murder.
Nezumi Kozō is the nickname of Nakamura Jirokichi, a Japanese thief and folk hero who lived in Edo during the Edo period. His exploits have been commemorated in kabuki theatre, folk songs, jidaigeki, and modern pop culture.
Based on Muneta Hiroshi's military novel. The main character, Yamaguchi Zensuke, is a military dog soldier. He joins the army and winds up sent overseas to China as a part of the military dog unit. He's ridiculed by others due to his inability to advance.
Could I But Live
Tokyo engineer Kariya arrives on a primitive tropical island, where he interacts with the Futori clan, to drill a well to power a sugar mill.
Following the detonation of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese military and the government clash over the demand from the Allies for unconditional surrender. Minister of the Army Anami leads the military officers who propose to fight on, even to the death of every Japanese citizen. Emperor Hirohito, however, joins with his ministers in asking the unthinkable, the peaceful surrender of Japan. When the military plots a coup to overthrow the Emperor's civilian government, Anami must face the choice between his desires and loyalty to his Emperor.
On his release from prison a young yakuza, along with his brother, decides to turn his back on criminal life instead of taking over the position of his recently deceased father, boss of the Asahina clan. But their exit proves more difficult than planned when their rival clan steps in to exact revenge.
A journalist decides to do his own investigation after a series of strange murders are committed during a local election campaign.
Contemporary musical drama film by Yasuzo Masumura.
One of many adaptations of "Onna no isshō", this time by Yasuzo Masumura as a starring vehicle for famed actress Machiko Kyo.
Yumechiyo, a geisha house madam recently diagnosed with a terminal illness, yearns to do something constructive with the little time she has left. Though her responsibility lies in taking care of her girls, she finds purpose in helping a man wrongfully accused of murder and in the process discovers love.
Based on Kakuko Mori's autobiography, about her life and retirement from acting due to her increasing blindness.
Tamio Moroi, a young university graduate, works at a large brewery where he is taught to do nothing but look busy. When his father goes insane, he is told to send money for medical research into the condition. This prompts him to pay his father a visit, leading to a series of mishaps that leaves him at the bottom of the heap in what he once expected to be a promising lifetime career.
Tetsuo is a young man living in Tokyo, who falls in love with a deaf-mute factory girl. He has always felt jealous of his college-educated brother, but ultimately wins both the girl and his father's acceptance and support in a touching and refreshing way.
The movie depicts the complicated romantic feelings of a woman who is attracted to a man other than her fiancé.
A 1960 crime film
A film adaptation of Masatsugu Nobuhiko's novel of the same name, directed by Tasaka Tomotaka and starring Nakamura Kinnosuke. This literary epic tells the story of how the protagonist, who has become mired in evil due to his poverty and low position, eventually awakens to humanity through an encounter with a nun. Shark was born without a father in a fishing village where the main occupation is catching sharks. In his poor and humiliating life, his only source of comfort is the tender love of his mother. However, on the night of a festival, the village burns to the ground and his mother dies. Left alone, Shark sets off for Kyoto with an old caster.
About 1786 the doings of a demented lord results in many masterless samurai, including Iyemon (Kei Sato) who is used to luxury and cannot adjust to the hand-to-mouth conditions & piecework of umbrella making. Having hired ruffians to make him look like a superior swordsman, he arranges for himself the opportunity of a profitable marriage. He hires the half-blind masseur Takuetsu (Sawamura Sounosuke) to seduce or rape his wife (Kyoko Mikage), so that she can be divorced or killed for adultery. But the masseur takes pity & informs Oiwa of her husband's horrid plot. Assisted by the merchant's daughter he intends to marry, Iyemon disfigures his wife attempting to poison her so he can marry higher. There's a lovingly gruesome sequence as she combs blad patches into her hair, kneeling deformed at her mirror, weeping with bitterness. She eventually cuts her own throat, swearing revenge.
A movie-loving nanny lives and works in the home of a university professor and eventually becomes the family's support system, leading a bright and joyful life.
A war veteran clashes with a mob boss in this crime saga. When Ryuji returns from the war, he finds himself torn by the death of an old friend - the son of crime kingpin Kiyomiya. A death Ryuji feels responsible for.
1964 Nikkatsu Theater of Life adaptation.
A wife is diagnosed with an incurable disease at a young age. Her husband loves her, supports her, and tries to stay with her. However, the wife is tormented by the fact that she is ruining her husband's future, and decides to divorce him as the only thing she can do for him.
This is a film about a real person. Sanada Yukimura fought a war against Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Dr. Kinoshita, whose rocket experiments had been a series of failures, discovers a strange flying saucer zooming through the night sky at super speed. He contacts the newspaper about it, but the editor dismisses him, saying he's gone mad and doesn't take him seriously at all. This is the imaginative sci-fi comedy "Frankie 14," featuring a groundbreaking and innovative story with flying saucers of unparalleled rarity and the appearance of artificial satellite people produced from single cells.
1961 Japanese movie
One day, a lone horseman rides into town with a wounded man strapped behind him. Joe, the Ace, had captured one of the bandits who had held up the armored payroll car headed for the dam construction site, takes the wounded man to the police and claims the reward offered. He is told to wait until the driver of the armored car returns to identify the bandit and goes over to the Blue Star where he is introduced to Mishima, the owner of the cabaret, who is highly respected in the town. Joe then meets Saburo, while fishing, and his lovely sister, who seem to sense the real man beneath the rough appearance and take him into their home. Word reaches Joe that the bandit he'd captured had been shot and he hurries over to the hospital.
Ken Ota is a Japanese-American GI. He comes to Hiroshima after WW2 looking for his big sister, but finds Keiko, a bomb victim with a keloid scar on her shoulder.
Drama about two college friends, now working for the same banking firm, torn apart by jealousy over their inequitable positions and love lives.
Eiichiro, a talented young salesman, grows disillusioned with office politics and returns to his family’s traditional tofu business, applying skill and rational planning to modernize it. Alongside his siblings, he transforms the shop into a thriving company, while his sister Atsuko overcomes social obstacles to marry.
In a small town, Tomoko, a new bus conductor, works hard to prove herself. She crosses paths with Saburō, the company president’s playful younger brother, who slowly reveals a more sincere side.
Teacher Miyako Hanai, disillusioned by her sisters’ unhappy marriages, rejects love until family conflicts and her mother’s unexpected remarriage lead her to rethink happiness and relationships.
After her mother’s death, junior high student Yoshiyama Kazuko lives in Yokohama with her father and little sister. One summer night, while stargazing with her childhood friend Goro and little sister Non-chan, they meet Kazuo, a mysterious young man in uniform who seems oddly familiar. After inhaling a lavender-scented mixture in a lab accident, Kazuko gains psychic powers, enabling her to time leap. Her strange experiences lead her closer to a shocking truth—Kazuo is a time traveller from the 27th century. He warns her that hearing the sound of something breaking triggers her time travel, but leaping into the past or future more than a day could bring dire consequences. A feisty Kazuko never bothers; she makes use of her abilities to help those around her until the ultimate price is paid. Her relentless kindness costs her the one person she loves most: her little sister, Non-chan.
In Yamada Village, which is suffering from a serious shortage of wives due to the wave of depopulation, four young men from the village decide to go on an arranged marriage. However, they are rejected by the other women because of Yamada Village's too rural character. Then, a beautiful young writer, Ayakoji Reika, who has fallen into a slump, comes to Yamada Village in search of the countryside...