Movies: Tsuruko Mano

This Japanese action-adventure is set in the 17th century when all forms of swordplay were banned. One fighter, an excellent swordsman believes the law is unfair. His brother keeps his opinions about the law to himself. The swordsman vents his frustr...

An Ishiro Honda film....

Three humorous love stories set in rural Japan....

The only son of a sushi chef hates sushi and decides to leave home to search for a job and make his own way....

An Ishiro Honda film....

A Fond Face from the Past is also set in a rural community, specifically a village outside Kameoka, near Kyoto. In some ways this short, thirty-six-minute film is Naruse's most moving negotiation of the militarist restrictions of the time, perhaps be...

Melodrama by Kon Ichikawa...

Slice of life film centered on a couple of years in the life of a rural high school girl....

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. Hi...

A legendary gangster raises himself out of a small town and gathers followers on his rise to power....

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Japanese war-era film...

When a group of young geologists declares a mountainside marked for residential development unstable, they are met with scorn on two fronts. On one end, they must contend with the local villagers who balk at the prospect of relocation; on the other, ...

An Ishiro Honda film....

A skilled country doctor's talents are such that he can even perform operations as difficult and novel as removing a patient's kidney for the first time in Japan. Unfortunately for him, however, his wife's addiction to gambling is of such a magnitude...

Following Flower Picking Diary (1939), Tamizo directed another film starring Hideko Takamine, based on a story by Nobuko Yoshiya. Takamine plays a poor young girl, trying to become a teacher on her quest to become independent to be able to look after...