Social & External
The people behind it
A biographical story of Tomoatsu Godai, the influential entrepreneur of the Meiji era who laid the foundation of the modern Japanese economy.
Five short stories from five different directors set ten years in Japan's future.
New Year's Eve at a posh hotel and all should be shipshape. It is not. There is the traditional party, an official ceremony, entertainment and a special dinner planned and yet there is trouble everywhere. An Animal is on the loose, a politician to protect, a prostitute to handle, a bellhop to focus and a few things more.
Baffling serial killings unfold in which the victims are tied up and left to starve. Tone was just released from prison after finishing his sentence for another crime, and he surfaces as a suspect but detective Tomashiro can't nail down conclusive proof.
Lord Oda Nobunaga plans to control Japan where rival warlords battle by waging war against several clans. His vassal Araki Murashige stages a rebellion and promptly disappears.
Director Koreyoshi Kurahara chronicles a year in the lives of Flep and Leila, two foxes living in Hokkaido, Japan's northernmost island, where the freezing winters are long and the mild summers short. After Flep defeats another male fox to become Leila's lifelong partner, they mate and raise a litter of five kits. With their family complete, the group must contend with human interference in their habitat, such as chicken farms and snowmobiles, and struggle against the debilitating cold of winter. The animals experience both triumph and tragedy, as the law of this harsh land proves – only the strong survive.
Based on four of the six short stories compiled in Murakami Haruki's anthology, After the Quake explores the complex aftermath of Japan’s earthquakes and other global crises. (Movie version of the TV drama).
Satoshi Murayama, the shogi (Japanese chess) master known as the arch-rival of Yoshiharu Habu, the shogi genius of the century, died of an intractable disease at age 29. Satoshi devoted his life to fighting not only the disease but also his rivals, feverishly pursuing the highest title, at risk to his life. Director Yoshitaka Mori (Hyakuhachi (2008), Space Brothers (2012)) depicts Murayama's true struggling life, full of love from his parents and teacher, based on the non-fiction novel written by Yoshio Osaki. Kenichi Matsuyama intensely portrays Satoshi and physically embodies the character.
In Tokyo, lonely patrons pay to sleep ("soine") with someone. Massage, cuddle, sleep… for comfort and nothing more than the warm embrace of another. Tasuku, a young man fresh out of a relationship, starts a new job as one of the cuddlers. He's nervous and reticent, but soon finds himself with a procession of clients, male as well as female. In his unique position as their companion, he finds himself privy to the true selves they keep closeted. Tender performance and contemplative writing elevate an exploration of the human need for comfort and tenderness, while learning to be true to oneself.
Seeking revenge after a brutal attack that left him disfigured, a former assassin gets drawn into a high-stakes conflict over a valuable treasure.
In January 1904, the situation between Japan and Russia had grown tense. The Emperor Meiji is deeply concerned, for Russia has started to build an invincible fortress at Port Arthur, and the relations between two countries have become strained to breaking point. General Nogi has retired to the first reserve and is now a gentleman farmer, but he is prepared for sudden mobilization. Finally, Japan declares war against Russia and Emperor Meiji appoints General Nogi as the commander of the force to attack Port Arthur. However, in spite of several all-out attacks, the fortress is strong and the casualties increase among the Japanese. Because of these reverses, there are loud cries for a change in command. However, the Emperor places his confidence in General Nogi.
A coming-of-age story about a high-school girl who wants to use magic, featuring the 11-member experimental band Vampillia
A passionate telling of the story of Sada Abe, a woman whose affair with her master led to an obsessive and ultimately destructive sexual relationship.
A true-story account of a German businessman who saved more than 200,000 Chinese during the Nanjing massacre in 1937-38.
In this companion piece and sequel to "Yojimbo," jaded samurai Sanjuro helps an idealistic group of young warriors weed out their clan's evil influences, and in the process turns their image of a proper samurai on its ear.
Charts the troubled teenage years of students Yūichi Hasumi and Shūsuke Hoshino, exploring the shifting and complex power dynamics of their relationship against the backdrop of Yūichi's love for the dreamy and abstract music of pop star Lily Chou-Chou.
The adventures of a blind, gambling masseur and master swordsman. Zatoichi targets a yakuza-controlled village, because war with a neighbouring town's smaller gang is brewing.
Returning to the village where a year before he had killed Hirate, a much-admired opponent, Zatoichi encounters another swordsman and former rival in love.
In the aftermath of a major earthquake, scientists predict that Japan will sink into the sea. As further disasters follow, politicians plead with other countries to take refugees, while scientists struggle to save Japan itself.
President of the territorial yakuza organization is being manipulated by a crooked leader in the military and some capitalists Ishikiri. The plan is to get multiple family of the organized crime groups based in Osaka to war it out and order the Shima to the Onishi group of the branch to expand the territory. Now members of the same yakuza gang are forced to fight each other over territory and honor.
A submissive hooker goes about her trade, suffering abuse at the hands of Japanese salarymen and Yakuza types. She's unhappy about her work, and is apparently trying to find some sort of appeasement for the fact that her lover has married.
In a suburban landscape, the lives of several families interlace with loss, despair and personal crisis. Esther Gold has lost focus on all but caring for her comatose son, Paul, and neglects her daughter and husband. Lawyer Jim Train is devoted to his career, not his family. Helen Christianson wants to find a new spark in life, while Annette Jennings tries to rebuild hers.
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.
In a small village in a valley everyone who reaches the age of 70 must leave the village and go to a certain mountain top to die. If anyone should refuse they would disgrace their family. Old Orin is 69. This winter it is her turn to go to the mountain. But first she must make sure that her eldest son Tatsuhei finds a wife.
A poor, struggling South Carolinian mother and daughter face painful choices with their resolve and pride. Bone, the eldest daughter, and Anney her tired mother, grow both closer and farther apart: Anney sees Glen as her last chance.
In 1923, teenager Kim Shun-Pei moves from Cheju Island, in South Korea, to Osaka, in Japan. Along the years, he becomes a cruel, greedy and violent man and builds a factory of kamaboko, processed seafood products, in his poor Korean-Japanese community exploiting his employees.
An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
A former American G.I. joins a yakuza family after his release from prison in post-World War II Osaka.
A jazz musician seeks refuge from a lynch mob on a remote island, where he meets a hostile game warden and the young object of his attentions.
Based on the writer/director's childhood, FARMING tells the story of a young Nigerian boy, 'farmed out' by his parents to a white British family in the hope of a better future. Instead, he becomes the feared leader of a white skinhead gang.
A life-size, inflatable sex doll suddenly comes to life one day. Without her owner knowing, she goes for a walk around town and falls in love with Junichi. She starts to date Junichi and gets a job at the same store where he works. Everything seems to be going perfectly for her until something unexpected happens.
When seventeen-year-old Hannah stumbles upon a website about Thinspiration--an online community devoted to anorexia as a life choice--she becomes an obsessive follower of the site founder, ButterflyAna. By the time Hannah's family realizes what is happening and get Hannah the help she needs, the disease has fully taken hold and Hannah is refusing to eat. Will this family be able to exorcise the demon of anorexia from their lives?
Defiant young activists take the women's suffrage movement by storm, putting their lives at risk to help American women win the right to vote.
The true story of 20-year-old Colleen Stan, a hitchhiking woman abducted by a young couple and held captive for seven years, during which time she's tortured and forced to live as a slave to her captors.
The legendary Roberto Duran and his equally legendary trainer Ray Arcel change each other's lives.
Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two young daughters, gets seduced by the world of online gambling and chat rooms where a virtual romance and sexual obsession ultimately leads to the murder of an innocent man.
Set during Japan's Shogun era, this film looks at life in a samurai compound where young warriors are trained in swordfighting. A number of interpersonal conflicts are brewing in the training room, all centering on a handsome young samurai named Sozaburo Kano. The school's stern master can choose to intervene, or to let Kano decide his own path.
Tom and Mae Garvey are a Tennessee farming couple battling violent floods to save their land. In addition to natural disasters, the Garveys fight to stop a selfish land developer and a local corporation from foreclosing on their farm. While Mae stays at home to care for their children and tend to the crops, Tom finds work as a scab at a steel mill to preserve his family's property.
Kyôko, a traumatized young Japanese girl, finds herself struggling with her self-confidence in her adult life. Growing up in a family without her mother and her sister, she constantly questions the rationale of sex and the notion of liberty in modern Japanese society.
In 1863, when American warships approach Japan, an enigmatic ronin becomes an important figure in a complex game of power between the Shogunate and the empire.
