Hyo Kitazawa

I Was a Prisoner in Siberia

Toho's production of the classic Japanese fairytale.

This film attempts to reconstruct the tension of the Battle of Shanghai through an episode in an understated way, introducting its story in a documentary mode. In the film story, Japan's marine regiment protects Japanese residents and Chinese refugees-women and young children-from rampant street fighting, Shanhai Rikusentai unsparingly uses its first eight minutes for an official-mannered self-justification of the war. From the viewpoint of explaining Japan's military operation,the narration refers to the city s spatial division in sync with maps on screen.

This is a rokyoku film of Tenjuken Ungetsu II (Hideko Itami), a popular rokyoku performer who was famous for her seven different voices for men and women of all ages.

A romance with political overtones about the relationship of a sheltered bourgeois woman and a doctor who devotes himself to caring for the poor. Over a ten-year period - from 1936 through the war - they find each other and are separated again by the events of those tumultuous days.

A film that begins with wit and comedy when a husband tries to hide and mask his drinking, which his Jesus freak and very Christian wife dislikes, by gargling and other methods, turns somber when the man loses his job after being fired. He attempts to keep us appearances by having parties and still going to night clubs, which means money is even more of a short supply. He turns to gambling and the race horse tracks as a result.

Machi

Jidaigeki from 1940

Japanese Women's Textbook

One of three titles released the same year, with the same title based on the same story. This is the P.C.L. (Toho) Version

1936 P.C.L. adaptation of Natsume's novel.

Fourth installment of Nikkatsu's "Drifter" series, with Kobayashi Akira.

About an establishment where old men pay to sleep besides young girls that had been narcotized and happen to be naked, the sleeping beauties. The old men are expected to take sleeping pills and share the bed for a whole night with a girl without attempting anything of bad taste like putting a finger inside their mouths.

A romantic melodrama about the shifting relationship between Ryosuke and Miki as their precarious employment and social circumstances shift around them.

In this semi-documentary, an older locomotive driver is tasked with training younger ones and is currently training two in particular. The old man is finding the task overwhelming as it is hard work with practical lessons and classroom components. His wife has died, but he has three daughters with the oldest taking care of her younger siblings.

1941 Toho adaptation of Natsume's novel.

Rebel Against Glory

Let's Go, Grandma!

Meet Saotome Ai, a high school girl from a well-to-do family. When she was a small child, she was in an accident that resulted in a young boy being permanently scarred between his eyes while she emerged unscathed. The young boy saved her life and although she never knew who he was, she never forgot him. Meet Taiga Makoto, a young man with a scar between his eyes who has had a rough life, but has emerged as a rough, tough bully - a thug and a brawler and about as rude as they come - all of which he blames on the incident that gave him his scar. When Ai and Makoto run into each other again, Ai feels guilt for what Makoto has become and decides to intervene and rehabilitate him. But is he a diamond in the rough, or just a bully?

Japanese domestic drama.

Under the Blossoming Peach

Sumako, a country girl, becomes a great actress with the help of Hogetsu,a scholar who brought some of European realism to the Japan's stage. The relationship leads to the end of his marriage and the breakup of his Arts Society. This is another version of Kenji Mizoguchi's film "The Love of Sumako the Actress" ("Joyû Sumako no koi"), from the same year. Both tells the story of the famous actress Sumako Mitsui (1886-1919), considered the first great modern theater actress in Japan. Mizoguchi himself is said to have preferred Kinugasa's version.

It was supposed to be about a love story, but it was and was not. An aircraft mechanic working for the government is matched by his boss with the latter man's daughter (Setsuko Hara) who is both beautiful and aggressive. Yet, he picks a woman who is less assertive as his bride.

On February 4th of the 16th year of the Genroku era, Yatō Uemon no Shichi reminisces while waiting his turn for seppuku at the Mizuno residence. When news of his lord, Asano Naganori, attacking Kira Yoshinaka in the palace reached Akō, Uemon no Shichi was sixteen. The family elder, Ōishi Kuranosuke, determined to avenge, gathered allies, but Uemon no Shichi's father, Chōsuke, being sickly and considered too young, was not included. Chōsuke committed suicide.

Lord for a Night is a 1946 Japanese film directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa.

Japanese film based on the life of writer Ichiyo Higuchi (1872-1896).

The premature death of a young mother serves as inspiration for her husband and son.

A drama about relations between Japanese immigrants and the indigenous Ainu on Hokkaido, the most northerly island of Japan. From a novel by Taijun Takeda.

Two sisters, one a dancer and the other a script supervisor at a big movie studio, become embroiled in union activities when a strike is called in sympathy with striking railroad workers, one of whom boards with the sisters and their parents. The girls' father argues with them about their strike but finds his views changing when he loses his job. Considered a lost film.

In 1941, overpopulated Japan faces an economic boycott and its armed forces push further to the south. And despite negotiations between Japan and the U. S. A. war is declared with the attack on Pearl Harbour. Victories follow for Japan on land and sea and her forces push forward to the borders of India. But gradually the tide turns in favour of the Allies and after the atom bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan is compelled to accept the Potsdam Declaration and by the order of the Emperor agrees to unconditional surrender. Under the supervision of the occupation forces the International Military Tribunal opens in Tokyo to try the Japanese war leaders. Established in the cause of justice, and to prevent future aggressive wars the trials drag on for two and a half years. And on December 23, 1948, General Tojo and six other war leaders mount the thirteen steps to the gallows at Tokyo's Sugamo prison.

Junai Monogatari AKA Story of Pure Love is about two poor youths, Mitsuko and Kando, rebelling against society in various ways, who are desperately trying to be together despite tortuous circumstances. The film depicts their lives as thieves, menial laborers who can get little pay, society outcasts, and of course, lovers. Junai Monogatari depicts, mostly, their struggles within the Japanese reformatory system and Mitsuko's worsening sickness.

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.

The 9th NHK Asadora. Starring Naoko Otani as a young woman living with her grandmother.

A television serial that was in turn adapted from a radio series and a novel, My Daughter And I featured a Japanese novelist who is married to a French woman who have one daughter. The man and his daughter begin a new life when the woman dies. Having difficulty spending time with his daughter, the man sends his daughter to a Christian boarding school. He remarries and brings his daughter back home. After the end of the World War his lot improves professionally, yet his second wife dies.