Kanto Woman Infamy
The story of three brothers who, after loosing their parents in the Great Kanto Earthquake, continued their respective yakuza family business and the revenge of the youngest one when his siblings were killed by a rival vicious yakuza boss. The first in the two part Daimon series.
In this first film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, adapted from the manga by Kazuo Koike, we are told the story of the Lone Wolf and Cub's origin. Ogami Itto, the official Shogunate executioner, has been framed for disloyalty to the Shogunate by the Yagyu clan, against whom he now is waging a one-man war, along with his infant son, Daigoro.
Set in the postwar turmoil, Akasaka no shimai paints a vivit portrait of the life of three sisters who struggle to live in Tokyo.
Shizuku lives a simple life, dominated by her love for stories and writing. One day she notices that all the library books she has have been previously checked out by the same person: 'Seiji Amasawa'.
The neglected common-law wife of a Japanese librarian is repeatedly harassed by a young man with a heart condition who seduces her with the prospect of a better life.
A Man Vanishes examines the concept of Johatsu, tackling the phenomenon of people missing in Japan over the years. It picks one such person from the list, someone who had seemed to disappear from the face of the earth due to embezzlement from his company, and the filmmakers begin an investigative documentary into the reasons behind and attempt at tracking him down.
Set against the backdrop of a bitter power struggle between the faction of the chairman of the board and the faction of the vice-chairman of the board of a large bank, this business mystery explores the lust, suffering and vindictiveness of one of the branch managers caught in the middle of the struggle. The term “cold current” refers to a current in which those who, once in it, find themselves will never emerge.
Writer Jippensha Ikku hears Tsutaya Juzaburo, a wholesaler of picture books, mutter on his deathbed, "Where has Sharaku gone?" He begins to figure out the true identity of Sharaku, who disappeared after about 150 portraits of actors he created came out.
A married woman lets her lover take naked pictures of her. The photos end up in possession of a man who starts blackmailing the couple.
The film depicts carnivalesque atmosphere summed up by the cry "Ei ja nai ka" ("Why not?") in Japan in 1867 and 1868 in the days leading to the Meiji Restoration. It examines the effects of the political and social upheaval of the time, and culminates in a revelrous march on the Tokyo Imperial Palace, which turns into a massacre. Characteristically, Imamura focuses not on the leaders of the country, but on characters in the lower classes and on the fringes of society.
Unlike traditional gangster movies, it is a gangster swashbuckler that mixes romance and humanity with a yakuza lover as the main character. A young man who heard that his former boss was killed is imprisoned by slashing his family's minions, and his lover is tortured by the enemy, but rescued by the imprisoned young man's nemesis.
Fifth film of "Mysterious Thirteen Nights" series.
Fukazawa Shino is a prostitute in the late Meiji period. Shino was deceived by Tatsukichi and sold. One day Shino came to like a thief (Yoshioka) who came as a customer.
When her only relative, her elder brother is accused of robbing and murdering an old woman loan-shark, pretty, young Kiriko travels from her home in Kyushu to Tokyo to get Japan's top lawyer to defend her brother. Unfortunately her naive idealism is shattered when the lawyer refuses to take the case based on her insufficient funds. What follows is a long determined revenge plot that sees the heroine become a Tokyo bar hostess and worse to punish the lawyer. The plot thickens with another murder mystery and a sleuthing reporter.
University student Akira meets the lovely 14-year-old Yumi, whom he had tutored years ago. Her mother is told by her doctor that the schoolgirl has leukaemia and has only 6 months to live.
In the prewar days leading up to the Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937, head flight instructor Lt. Katō Tateo of the Imperial Japanese Army-Air Corps trains new volunteers from the Army's Infantry to become Japan's next generation of fighter pilots at the Tokorozawa Flying School. Flying Kawasaki Ko-4 biplanes, Lt. Katō will train both friend and future foe alike. But as war in China breaks out, Katō now in command of the 5th Rentai will take his untested men flying antiquated planes into aerial combat against the Chinese Air Force who is now headed by Lt. Cho who Katō both earlier befriended and personally trained himself. While Katō's squadron ultimately achieves air superiority over the skies of Manchuria, it comes at a high price in men to which each loss carries a heavy burden that he alone must carry. As the war widens into the Second World War, Captain Katō must battle an ever advancing array of deadlier new enemies flying ever more modern fighter planes.
A young man leaves his widowed mother on her improverished farm and makes his career in the Japanese navy.
The tragic, yet exciting story of the friendship between Nakayama Yasubei, a member of the 47 Ronin, and Tange Tenzen, a relative by marriage of the vile Lord Kira.
Organized Violence II
Twelfth film in the long-running series Daiei Studio's Woman Gambler with Kyoko Enami starring where she plays the woman gambler Ogin.
Set in the icy wilderness of Hokkaido during the early days of the Meiji era, where the brutal warden of Kabato Prison terrorizes convicts sentenced to forced labor to build the roads needed to open up the territory.
A street war breaks loose between two rival gangs in the Kansai region of Japan. Goro is in the middle of action. Through a knife fight against Sueo, a high profile gangster from Busou-kai, Goro notices a familiar face approaching him from amidst the chaos - his girlfriend, Yuri. Goro had sent her to safety, but she had returned, aching to see him. Caught between Goro and his enemy knife, she reunites with her love - the price was her life.
In Osaka during the Edo period, ruler Sanada Yukimura was in losing position, fearing Toyotomi's blood descendents would end, he impregnates one of five Shinano female ninja with the seed of Toyotomi Hideyoshi in hopes of continuing the bloodline. Princess Sen and the five female ninja escape from Osaka castle by blending in with the handmaidens. Lord Tokugawa Ieyasu who was supposed to rule all under the heavens was informed of this secret. So Ieyasu orders five samurai of the Iga Ninja clan (brought by Hattori Hanzo) to stop the Toyotomi bloodline by killing the Kunoichi ninja. An attack of ninja magic arts unfolds in a battle of the sexes.
Based on a story by Akiyuki Nosaka.
Helping her mother manage a nightclub, young Emiko quickly realizes how difficult life is.
Japanese drama film.
A woman, Tome, is born to a lower class family in Japan in 1918. The title refers to an insect, repeating its mistakes, as in an infinite circle. Imamura, with this metaphor, introduces the life of Tome, who keeps trying to change her poor life.
Explicit drama about a young woman who becomes involved with a group of college students who play "spin-the-bottle" and the women must make love or strip. The woman, Junko, becomes involved with Makoto, leader of the gang, becomes pregnant, has an abortion, then gets involved with an architect.
Second part of the series where sex magic skills of female and Iga ninjas clash over enourmous treasure of the Toyotomi family, discovered in connection with the plot to overthrow the shogunate.
Tsutomu Yoshioka, a Tokyo office worker, is enaged to Mariko, the niece of his company's president. But Yoshioka has a crisis of consence when he remembers his former love Mitsu, a rural girl whom he met and later left while in college. Shimako, a former friend, persuades Yoshioka to meet with Mitsu while she plots to blackmail Yoshioka by photographing the meeting to break up Mariko and Yoshioka.
By going to the Philippines, Imamura comes to meet people living in an extreme poverty. He discovers very quickly that some communities are under the control of cruel & armed pirates. Imamura will come to meet those men in order to understand their position.
女ねずみ小僧
Mystery drama starring Akira Onodera, based on the novel by Seishi Yokomizo about Kosuke Kindaichi.
Kuniko Mukōda's masterpiece, a poignant and subtle portrait of the jealousy and suspicion that secretly swirl behind seemingly peaceful family relationships.
Ginji (Teruhiko Aoi), together with Yasugoro, a bathhouse owner, Toshiro, a ronin, Kojiro, a samurai retainer's son, and Omitsu, a kimono shop owner's daughter .... use drumsticks as a weapon against the evil that lurks in the city of Edo.
秘められた関係
丹後・宮津殺人岬
The detectives of Nana-magari station investigate a wide variety of crimes in 70s Japan, ranging from the mundane to the absolutely bizarre.
大雪山殺人事件
津軽竜飛岬・風の殺意
白馬岳殺意の峰
しらべる女１
A unique drama that contrasts the lives of a family of elite salarymen in Tokyo and a family of landowners in Tokorozawa, Saitama, while exploring the timeless themes of drama such as human happiness, love and marriage in their everyday lives, told in a straightforward narrative style.
