Movies: Akira Ishihama

Down-on-his-luck veteran Tsugumo Hanshirō enters the courtyard of the prosperous House of Iyi. Unemployed, and with no family, he hopes to find a place to commit seppuku—and a worthy second to deliver the coup de grâce in his suicide ritual. The seni...

After handing in a report on the treatment of Chinese colonial labor, Kaji is offered the post of labor chief at a large mining operation in Manchuria, which also grants him exemption from military service. He accepts, and moves to Manchuria with his...

Three stories of moral sickness set during Japan’s prosperous Genroku era are told in this bloody follow-up to the sexploitation classic Shogun’s Joy of Torture, the politically incorrect moral lessons paint a trio of tales of tragic heroines caught ...

A master sculptor and his apprentice are trapped in a bad snow storm after finding a special tree for carving a statue for the local temple. Finding refuge in an abandoned hut they celebrate their luck in finding the tree but soon they are visited by...

The year is 1932, and a woman, whose tenant-farmer fiancé is fighting in China, is raped by the landowner's son, who has returned from the war with a crippling injury, and then forced into marriage with him. In four more chapters, presented over thre...

Doctors Kazamatsuri and Onizuka are geneticists researching cures on diseases such as AIDS and cancer by performing experiments to strengthen the human body. The test subject is Shin Kazamatsuri, motorcycle racer son of Doctor Kazamatsuri. Unknown to...

While under sedation in a dentist's office, a young art student has sex fantasies about naked women, vampires and a beautiful patient he saw in the office....

Famous detective Kindaichi solves a series of mysterious murders in a wealthy family. An excellent blend of intrigue and betrayal, set against the backdrop of wealth, this film is loaded with twists and turns and surprises at every corner....

A young student falls into a hopeless romantic attraction to a sick girl, whom he can only see from afar....

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 inci...

Five longtime friends get back together, but are disappointed to find that their bonds are not as strong as they once were....

A father and son are both heavy drinkers. However, the son dies in an accident at a bar, leaving behind a fiance…. A unique social satire that focuses on why people drink alcohol....

A fishing union depends on two brothers to make up the losses caused by the dishonest captains they replaced....

Fukami, a secretary engaged to company president Kaido, her employer, is invited by his close friends, the Nogis, to a three-day-two-night tour. The tour group is traveling in a luxurious coach to Lake Megami in the Tateshina Plains. On the way, they...

Christ in Bronze is a 1955 black-and-white Japanese film directed by Minoru Shibuya. It was entered into the 1956 Cannes Film Festival....

Keiko’s life is turned upside down when she discovers that she has been infected with HIV. As she struggles to cope with the situation and resist the infection, she finds new friendship and companionship with a journalist named Miyuki and a man named...

A man she was once in a relationship with has been killed. A wife keeping a secret from her husband gets involved in a strange case....

This drama of middle-class life in postwar Japan tells the story lower-middle-class workers in the city of Kawasaki, and their troubles and travails....

Ignoring the protests of his working-class mother, a young man becomes wrapped up in the world of delinquents and yakuza....

A young widow, made world weary by her abusive, neglectful husband, finds herself in a minor scandal when she's seen with her intense, no-nonsense childhood sweetheart....