The original silent drama from Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu, "A Story of Floating Weeds," follows a travelling theatre troupe's visit to a seaside town and the group's leader's emotional reunion... more
Actor Yūsuke Kafuku (Hidetoshi Nishijima) dearly loved his wife Oto (Reika Kirishima), despite her infidelities-and her abrupt death pushed him to mental collapse. Offered a comeback staging of... more
Having left her countryside home to find success in the city, lovely part-time bartender Yoshie (Miyuki Kuwano) was readily charmed by the swagger of customer Eiji (Mikijirô Hira). As they move in... more
Paul Schrader's visually stunning, collagelike portrait of the acclaimed Japanese author and playwright Yukio MISHIMA (played by Ken Ogata) investigates the inner turmoil and contradictions of a man... more
Takashi Shimura, Nobuo Kaneko. The renowned director, Akira Kurosawa, combines poetic imagery and complex flashbacks to tell the story of a man who vows to make his final days meaningful after he... more
Akira Terao, Mitsuko Baisho, Toshie Negishi. Eight mythical, dreamlike vignettes thematically united by their concern with man's relationship to nature tell stories of animal weddings, ghosts of... more
Eiji Okada, Kyoko Kishida, Hiroko Ito. An entomologist misses his bus in the middle of a desert to get home to Tokyo. After descending into a sand-pit hut to lie with a mysterious desert woman, he... more
The lyrical, profoundly moving STILL WALKING is the most personal work to date from contemporary Japanese master Hirokazu Kore-eda (MABOROSI, AFTER LIFE, NOBODY KNOWS). Fashioned as a tribute to his... more
Having grown in a devout Christian family and desperate to please his sin-obsessed Catholic priest father, young Yu (Takahiro Nishijima) a fairly normal kid who has no legitimate sins to confess... more
One of the most powerful of the family portraits by Yasujiro Ozu (TOKYO STORY), LATE SPRING tells the story of a widowed father who feels compelled to marry off his beloved only daughter. Eminent Ozu... more
What one memory of your life would you want to live over and over? In this compelling and heartfelt fantasy from Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda ("Maborosi"), the newly dead are met in a "way... more
When an idealistic governor disobeys the reigning feudal lord, he is cast into exile, his wife and children left to fend for themselves and eventually separated by vicious slave traders. Under the... more
Chishu Ryu, Setsuko Hara. Ozu's moving masterpiece finds generational conflict within a post-WWII Japanese family. An elderly couple travels to Tokyo from their small fishing village to visit their... more
Machiko Kyo, Mitsuko Mito, Kinuyo Tanaka. Two peasants in war-torn 16th-century Japan abandon their families to seek their fortunes in the spoils of war. In attaining his goal, each man destroys his... more
Tatsuya Fuji, Eiko Matsuda. A controversial piece of Japanese cinema originally banned in the States for its graphic sex scenes and still banned in Japan, this Nagisa Oshima-directed erotica classic... more
The final film from Yasujiro Ozu (Tokyo Story) was also his last masterpiece, a gently heartbreaking story about a man's dignified resignation to life's shifting currents and society's modernization.... more
This haunting, kabuki-inflected version of a Japanese folk legend is set in a remote mountain village, where food is scarce and tradition dictates that citizens who have reached their seventieth year... more
One of the ineffably lovely domestic sagas made by Yasujiro Ozu at the height of his mastery, The Flavor of Green Tea over Rice is a subtly piercing portrait of a marriage coming quietly undone.... more
Nobuko Otowa, Taiji Tonoyama, Shinji Tanaka. In a totally dialogue-less examination of a Japanese's family's isolated life, island-dwellers struggle with even daily tasks, such as the boat trip... more
Kazuo Hasegawa, Machiko Kyo, Yataro Kurokawa. As payment for providing an escape for a Japanese lord under attack, an 11th-century samurai warrior asks for the hand of a lady-in-waiting. Although the... more
This heartrending masterpiece by Kenji Mizoguchi (Ugetsu) about the give-and-take between life and art marked the director's first use of the hypnotic long takes and eloquent camera movements that... more
This lyrical adaptation of the beloved Japanese novel by Junichiro Tanizaki was a late-career triumph for world-class director Kon Ichikawa (THE BURMESE HARP, FIRES ON THE PLAIN). Revolving around... more
While touring 19th-century Japan, kabuki performer/female impersonator Yukinojo Nakamura (Kazuo Hasegawa) tracked down the three prosperous merchants who had disgraced and driven his parents to... more
An abused housewife works as a nude model in order to satisfy her desires. Under the influence of a depraved English professor, she eventually turns to prostitution. Elsewhere, a female cop... more
One of a string of late-career masterworks made by Kenji Mizoguchi in the early 1950s, A Story from Chikamatsu (a.k.a. The Crucified Lovers) is an exquisitely moving tale of forbidden love struggling... more