A "Goze" is a blind entertainer who travels to various places singing stories while playing the shamisen (Japanese three-stringed lute). Becoming a goze due to her blindness at seven-years-old, Haru was strictly trained with a parent's affection by her once kind mother, Tome.
Toyo Okumura
A young woman grows emotionally as she overcomes the deaths of those dear to her after meeting a female mortician..
AS HASHIMOTO
This is a mystery-thriller which is about the Jr.High School faculty members in Japan who prompt action for checking student's bag in secret to prevent the student crime.
Due to the economic recession, the orchestra is shut down. The members hear later that the orchestra will be reformed. Only some of the members, who have not yet been rehired, gather for the orchestra. For the first time since they disbanded the orchestra plays together, but they sound horrible. At that time, the conductor Tetsusaburo Tendou appears in front of them.
Takie takamori
Under the Nagasaki Sky
A girl has been sent back in time from 500 years in the future because she has been deemed unnecessary there. Naturally, she has trouble fitting in, until one day, she meets a mysterious transfer student...
Portrait of the Wind centers on Tamio Murase, a world-traveling photographer who came home to take over the family business after his father’s fatal heart attack. One day at the family photo studio, he finds a kindred spirit in Ayako and the requisite sparks fly between them. The initial portions of the film deal with their budding romance, and it isn’t long before the two become a serious couple, and Ayako is pregnant with Tamio’s child.
Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, "From the New World" wafts through a hospice recreation room. Sitting at the grand piano is a young girl, Chiori, with a prodigious ability to play any piece of music after one hearing. Keisuke Kisaragi whose career was abruptly cut short when he jumped in front of a bullet fired by a crazed gunman. The nerves in one hand were severed but he saved the life of Chiori. The tragic incident takes the lives of Chiori's parents, however, and Keisuke becomes her guardian. Not long after their return to Japan, Keisuke discovers Chiori's musical gift.
The shock of her fiance's sudden dissolution of their relationship causes university student, Miki, to lose her voice. While recuperating in a hospital in her hometown of Hakodate, she learns of the tragic life of her deceased mother, Kaoru, from her grandmother.
Commencing well-respected Nippon director Kazuo Kuroki's sixth decade behind the camera, "A Boy's Summer in 1945" (literally "A Beautiful Summer in Kirishima") is a lyric, novelistic drama set in the countryside in the last days before Japan's surrender ending WWII. Striking a welcome retro note in its languid pacing and delicate handling of seriocomic ensemble threads, handsome production is a natural for fests. It might also prove a cornerstone for retrospectives or ancillary releases of works by a helmer ("Preparation of the Festival," "Ronin-gai") who's long been appreciated at home but has won just limited attention abroad.
Shizuka (Mami Nakamura) is a young school teacher. She moves to a small village by the sea, near her own home country. The elementary school she is assigned has only 20 students. But her last assignment was not very successful and she has lost the confidence. One day, a student finds a white ship sailing on the sea, far from the school. They begin an investigation and finally identifies the ship. It's a cruiser called Rainbow Love. 'Why don't we write a letter to the captain?' Shizuka proposes. And everyone gets excited...
Takeda, head nurse
Masako
Fumiko Hayashi
A drama depicting the world of the female writer Midori Osaki in three parts: the dramatic creation of her masterpiece, "Wanderings in the Realm of the Seventh Sense," her unknown years spent in poor health and poverty, and the present-day world from which we see her work.
Based on the long running manga by Sadao Shouji.
Takanezawa, a young head of the Yokohama Kibe group, confronts the Kansai organization that forces the transfer of Shima with the debt of the previous generation as a shield. Appeared by Riki Takeuchi and Hagiwara fashion.
A young man fails his company entrance exams and leaves home to work at a run-down cinema in Tokushima, whose owner lives to bring entertaining films to the residents of his small town.
The film depicts the relationship between a beautiful teacher and a male teacher, popular among female students, an excellent student who tells the teacher about his feelings using an answering machine, and a high school student who bets on whether she can have a relationship with a male teacher. This is the debut full-length work by Hideo Nakata.
An undercover narcotics officer is killed, and after his funeral some yakuza break into his apartment and rape his wife, Nami, while looking for the drugs they claim he stole from them. Afterwards Nami attempts to commit suicide, but after being rescued by a mysterious yakuza she decides to infiltrate the gang and get revenge.
Teacher at Japanese language school
Looks at the lives of Chinese people in Japan.
A woman who, disguised as a beggar, turns out to be a formidable assassin, is charged by a warden to infiltrate a women's prison, to run the one that took his eye with a wooden spoon carved from a knife - a woman named Nami Matsushima, known within the walls under the nickname of Scorpion.
Skinless Night (which borrows its title from a best-selling brand of condoms) centers on the 33-year-old Kayama Mutsuro, who supports his wife, child and a small team of employees by making porn videos. Profit margins are very low, the financier has his own troublesome ideas about the kind of tape he wants produced, the company office isn't an ideal environment for child-minding, and the job constantly throws up new challenges - like shopping for bondage gear or devising the special visual effects for a 'golden shower' scene. On top of everything else, Kayama is heading for a mid-life crisis. The rediscovery of his unfinished student film crystallizes his general sense of dissatisfaction, and leads him to rethink his life and work, to the chagrin of many of his friends, colleagues, and family members. Mochizuki's quasi-autobiographical début feature observes both the workings of the porn sub-culture and the spiritual problems of its central character.
A one shot game setup by lonely outlaws!
Ayano Teshigawara
The unexpected death of Fujishima Motoharu, president of a medium-sized firm, triggers a fierce battle over his estate inheritance among family members.
A young doujinshi writer doesn't win the literary prize award, and ends up killing the selection committee.
A documentary compilation that shows various clips from the Roman Porno series of movies from 1971 to 1988.
The movie compiles footage taken by Ogawa Production for a period of more than ten years after the collective moved to Magino village. Unique to this film are fictional reenactments of the history of the village in the sections titled "The Tale of Horikiri Goddess" and "The Origins of Itsutsudomoe Shrine". Ogawa combines all the techniques that were developed in his previous films to simultaneously express multiple layers of time—the temporality of rice growing and of human life, personal life histories, the history of the village, the time of the Gods, and new time created through theatrical reenactment—bring them into a unified whole. The faces of the Magino villagers appear in numerous roles transcending time and space—sometimes as individuals, sometimes as people who carry the history of the village in their memories, sometimes as storytellers reciting myths, and even as members of the crowd in the fictional sequences.
In the 12th century, Buddhism was still a relatively new religion in Japan. At that time, one school (Shingon) offered extensive training in complex and very demanding practices which might eventually bring about spiritual purification and realization. Various Zen schools offered students a lengthy path, literally composed of a blank wall and unceasing meditation. Yet another school (Tendai) emphasized complex metaphysics and the study of philosophical systems. Basically, all of them were designed to cater to the few who were able to give up everything else in their lives and focus on liberation, such as scholars and noblemen. In this historical and biographical drama, this is the situation that the young Shinran (1173-1263) discovered when he began exploring Buddhism as an alternative to the violence and ceaseless civil wars that racked Japan at the time.
Sue Senba
When a fugitive begins a romance with the woman hiding him from the law, it becomes uncertain whether he will ever escape the shadow of his heinous crimes--or the detectives hot on his trail.
Junko Matsuura
A university student Hitomi falls in love with a middle-aged man Okawa, who was the lover of her deceased mother. Hitomi's feelings shift back and forth as she is not sure whether it is true love or just a realization of her mother's romantic dream...
Chieko Fujikura
Natsuko is witnessed carrying on an affair with her boss, Misawa, by the unmarried Chieko. However, Chieko dies by falling and is found about ten days later in the shrubbery in front of the company. It is revealed that Chieko led a flashy private life and frequented a host club. Moreover, it seems that she was having an affair with Division Chief Yamazaki.
Sachiko
Tatsuo, a reverent lumberjack, seeks to disrupt plans to build a marine park on his family land, instead promoting his traditions in reactionary ways.
Bar madame
Filled with guilt over his forbidden desires, a young man leaves home and his studies. He finds a new smaller place to stay, a low-paying but satisfying job and a girlfriend. Then his mother, unable to fight her forbidden desires, shows up.
Natsuko
After a woman is framed for the murder of her fisherman husband, she seeks out a bloody revenge on the corrupt businessmen responsible.
Proprietress of 'Hero'
A lower-middle-class policeman lives decadently, chasing cheap beer and girls at the same time he's running from loan sharks and his personal expectations.
Japanese drama film.
Oraku
When the 'Lowly Ronin' helps an orphaned teenage girl avoid being turned into a prostitute, she then claims he is her father and they start a farm as father and daughter until fate steps in and he must draw his sword.
Ochika
The actor Koheiji is terribly in love with the wife of his best friend, the playwright Takuro; to get her, he would even kill Takuro.
Sumie
Famous detective Kosuke Kindaichi follows a dying man's words to an enigmatic island, where he meets beautiful twin sisters and tragic events unfold.
Mitsu Harada
Keiko Inagawa (Asami Kobayashi) pays a visit to neurologist Aizawa about her fiancé Tatsuo Tamura (Kaoru Kobayashi). A mysterious case involving the disappearance of Tatsuo’s three brothers, one after the other, is yet to be resolved and now Tatsuo, seized with the idea that he too may disappear, has had a nervous breakdown. Aizawa suggests that Tatsuo recount his dreams as a means of solving the mystery, since human beings have an instinct that foretells the near future in the form of a dream. Keiko and Tatsuo eventually discover that the three disappearances have a strange connection…
Yukiko Nishinohara
Depicting the turbulent life of truck driver Takashi, his fellow drivers, and the women he meets.
Omon
Junko Sato
This is a combination of stories dealing with the ecstatic adventures of high school student Sachiko.
Sister
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
A selfish playboy uses rich women to pay off his debts. Divorcing his wife and marrying the woman he loves throws him into a spiral of destruction.
Chizuru
1980 Japanese film distributed by Shochiku.
A group of bandits flee to the mountains after killing an evil moneylender. Remake of Hiroshi Inagaki's Jigoku no mushi (1938).
Shimako Maruyama
Miyashita plays an office clerk who is having an affair with her married boss. Since he refuses to leave his wife, Miyashita and another couple plan to kidnap his daughter to collect a ransom.
Chiyo
Okoma (literally, Red Cherry) was a woman gambler until she retired from the yakuza world. Two years later, she returns home, and finds that the big boss has been assassinated and his daughter is having trouble keeping things in line against the rival gang headed by the men who killed her father. Okoma decides to avenge her former boss and help his daughter, a former friend of hers. She recruits her own gang, starting with an expert knife-fighter, her former lover. After a fight, the new Gang Leader captures and tortures Okoma sadistically.
Yoshiko Kuwata
From Hokkaido to Tokyo, hunting dog Goro embarks on a long and grueling journey to reach home. With the loss of his master who held a secret to a weapons smuggling case and the corruptions of those who are involved, Goro's adventure unfolds.
Yuki
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Woman with Red Hair
Junko Miyashita plays a mysterious hitchhiker picked up by a brute of a construction worker named Kenzo who takes her back to his run-down and cramped apartment in a not so good part of town. Claiming that she is running away from an abusive husband, she shacks up with him. In a futile attempt to escape the bleak working class surroundings, the pair engage in an obsessive erotic relationship.
Sadako Asai
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Osen
Yakuza Gang War is at the height in North Kyūshū Area in the summer of 1950, particularly between the Okagen Group and the rising Hashiden Gang. Now with the mediation/interference of the Americans, they decide to settle it in a peaceful, *democratic* way, that is, to settle it with a baseball game. Now, with its money and power, The Hashiden group soon recruits a group of gamblers known to be good at baseball from the whole country. So, what is the Okagen Gumi gonna do?
Murakami tomoyo
A parable about the inefficiency and anachronism of the Japanese educational system, which places an unusually large amount of importance on cramming for university entrance examinations, Panic High School is about the suicide of a high school student and its ensuing fallout at his school. When one of his classmates becomes frustrated with the math teacher's lack of sensitivity to the suicide, the student steals a rifle, returns to school, aerates the teacher's chest and then holds members of his class captive. This leads to an aggressive standoff with the police and lots of shots of his parents crying and bowing in shame, totally mortified.
Menbiki Okyo
Kumokiri Nizaemon, a former samurai warrior, has abandoned his class to become the leader of a gang of thieves. He leads his outlaws in an attempt to rob the castle of his former clan.
Miyako Hanamura
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Reiko
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Machiko Kikuma
The background is Yuraku-cho in Tokyo and the film shows how desperately the women, who had led sheltered lives before the war, struggled to keep alive and the innate strength of post-war women.
Sanae Kirikawa
Roman Porno from 1977.
Chiaki Onda
17th film in the Apartment Wife series.
Mako Ohki
Roman Porno from 1977.
Roman Porno from 1977.
Taken out of the pages of history itself, this is the story of the sizzling love between Kenreimon-in of the Taira Clan and Yoshitsuné of the Minamoto Clan. When the Taira Clan had met ignominious defeat at the hands of Yoshitsuné, Kenreimon-in had jumped into the sea with her son, the infant Emperor, but only she had been rescued by Yoshitsuné. A rough-hewn warrior, Yoshitsuné had taken her by force until he awakened an answering love in the Empress with his chamber techniques.
Cherry blossoms are in full bloom. It is time for college students to go on a drinking spree under the cherry tree - It's "Hanami" time! Two freshmen and a sophomore are ordered to stake out a spot for the entire pep squad. Plans are initiated from the night before; three of them have to pull an all-nighter. Once the night falls, the sky turns pitch black. Rival pep squad of the Roka College emerge from the darkness and an all-out turf war begins.
Kotoji Moroi
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 incident seemed to have no continuity...
Tae
A somewhat liberal adaptation of the life of painter Shuu Ito, the film focuses on his sexual torture of two wives and a prostitute. Ito chronicles the sessions in journals, shares his pseudo-Sadean philosophy, and drives women mad with equal hell-bent intensity.
Someko
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
A Japanese sailor finds a colony of Eskimos in the Arctic and decides to stay with them. He comes off at a certain moment to look for his luck in the gold rush in Alaska. But he does not forget them.
“Get them all – girls, school credits, money – without an effort!" These are the rumors that freshman Hachirota Kawachi heard about the pep squad; his reasons for instant enrollment. Hachirota may fall a few screws short of a hardware store, but when it comes to yakuza ties, he has plenty. He is the direct descendant and heir to the notorious Akushin-kai gang. Although this was enough information to keep the pep squad seniors quiet, it’s not quite enough for Aota.
Hatae Iwamoto
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Harue Tachibana
A Nikkatsu Roman Porno movie
Life in the pep squad is all about harsh discipline. Seniors are "Gods", juniors are "Humans", sophomores are "Slaves" and freshmen are treated like "Trash". One sunny day, two freshmen are entrusted with the task to dry out the squadron's flag; the most cherished and symbolic item of the squad. When they accidentally burn a hole in the flag with a cigarette, they blame Aota. Aota attempts to take full responsibility by committing "harakiri", but changes his mind during the process – a deep stab to the stomach has inspired him with a better idea.
Roman Porno from 1976. A man runs a jewelry store, supported by his serious and chaste wife. It was an ordinary and peaceful marriage. One day, her husband was threatened by a man who was imitating a yakuza, and was selling smuggled, irregular jewelry at the store. The impatient husband could not refuse it. Complications ensue.
Minako Sayanomiya
The landlord of a boarding house in 1923 Tokyo, is keen on spying on the bizarre close encounters taking place beneath his roof. One day he sees a prostitute killing a customer, and decides he's found his soulmate.
Shizue Sakura
Roman Porno from 1976.
Chiho Fujita
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Miyako Morishita
Roman Porno from 1975.
Okiku
Roman Porno from 1975.
Satoko Nonomiya
Roman Porno from 1975.
Aki Kojima
Roman Porno from 1975.
Mina
Roman Porno from 1975.
Shizue Yagishita
Roman Porno from 1975.
Abe Sada
The young and beautiful Sada Abe, the daughter of a rich merchant, is banished for losing her virginity after being raped by a college student. Sada wanders the city, becoming a geisha and eventually meeting Kichizo, a posh restaurateur who falls under her spell. Together, they embark on a week-long sexual escapade filled with dangerous obsessions. Their complete descent into each others desires culminates in a shocking crime of passion which captures the city's headlines. Based on a real event from 1936.
Kimiko
Pinku from 1975.
Kimiko
Writer and ladies-man Yonosuke, who gives inept English lessons (using Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet), is ushered into a lonely woman's house one rainy night. Her husband is at the front in the war with Russia and, as our hero will soon discover, she's wearing a chastitity belt...
Shimako
It's the evening before the day all brothels must be shut-down, according to the new law, in 1958. At the Kofukuya's (literally, the house that sells happiness), five prostitutes decide to celebrate the day. Erotism, drama, and comedy mix as each hour, and a different event passes, in which all the women's stories come to the surface.
Fumie Hirabayashi
Roman Porno from 1974, focusing on the daily life of lower-class individuals in the slums of Osaka.
Tsukinojo
In historical times, the Shogun family employs a group of Iga ninjas to take over the Akizuki clan's lands. The Akizuki hire the Fumi ninjas, a group of female warriors who enhance their fighting ability with sexual magic such as the "white snake spell". When the Akizuki emerge victorious, Tsukinojo, the leader of the Fumi ninjas, marries Lord Akizuki.
Kyoko Shibata
Kyoko has been married to Keisuke three years but recently, she has this feeling that she cannot entirely trust her husband. She hires Terao, a private eye, to prove her doubts are groundless. Poor Kyoko does not seem to know that, "He who digs a pit for others, falls into it himself". The private eye and his friend call on Kyoko when her husband is out and brutally rape her over and over again. By slow degrees, she gives herself up to the sexual pleasures she feels while being brutally treated. It is a sensation she had never experienced before, little knowing who had masterminded the tortures.
Oshin
Roman Porno from 1974.
Hitomi
Roman Porno from 1974.
Mrs. Takasaki
Roman Porno from 1973.
Hanakiyo
Shotaro, the son of a geisha house, is still merely a kid and is often told to spend the night in a room with geisha when the patron of a certain geisha takes over his own room. A precocious lad in the first places, he knows more about sex than many adults. He discovers he is old enough to make women pregnant and so his adventures begin, here, there and everywhere.
Naeko Yoshida
Pinku from 1974.
Matsuo
Since the arrival of the Black Ships, the Tokugawa Shogunate's dream of peace has been shattered, and the succession problem of the ailing Shogun Iesada has become a headache. At the same time, Tamamo, a prostitute in Yoshiwara, is dismissed from her position at the behest of a high-ranking noble family who has come on a secret mission.
Seiko Aida
A young office worker grows up to become an insatiable sexual deviant thanks to her mother's "lusty blood". She can't control her abnormal desire, which flares up at the mere sight of a man. The blood of debauchery hidden in the seemingly ordinary and healthy body of an office worker delights and confounds men.
Sodeko
The world is in turmoil with the October Revolution of 1917, riots over the inflationary price of rice, and the military expedition to Siberia in 1918. But Shinsuke spends his days in the arms of geishas, paying little heed to the events happening around him.
Noriko Matsubayashi
Roman Porno from 1973.
Junko
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Nui
Roman Porno from 1973.
Yasuko Mimori
Roman Porno from 1973.
Akiko Asari
Akiko is a housewife who is bored with her relationship. She lives an adulterous passion with a colleague of her husband, decides to follow him to Hong Kong where he has just been transferred. Akiko's husband goes out looking for them, without success. Desperate, he lets himself be dragged into the underworld of the city by a mysterious Sino-Japanese mongrel who plunges him into drugs and pimping. Until the day he finally learns the terrible truth about his unfaithful wife.
Miwa
Masako Ihara
Roman Porno from 1973.
Hiroko Fukunaga
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Ritsuko Asakura
Pinku from 1973.
Roman Porno from 1973.
Yoko
A female high school teacher suffers from amnesia after being attacked by several men. She is married and has a happy family life, but an incident from the past haunts her regardless of her memory loss.
Kanae Tomioka
An upwardly-mobile banker's boss introduces him to the adopted daughter of a wealthy client. He falls in love with the girl and wants to marry her, not knowing that she is involved in a kinky sadomasochistic relationship with her artist father.
Saeko Koizumi
Another episode of the "apartment wife", dealing with a night of pleasure.
Roman Porno from 1973.
Shohkan
Roman Porno from 1973.
Natsuko Takemura
This Roman Porno melodrama from Nikkatsu in-house luminary Chusei Sone concerns a married woman (Junko Miyashita) whose husband’s infidelity drives her to sleep with both of her sisters’ lovers. Kazuko Shirakawa, in one of her final appearances before her highly publicized wedding, plays the husband's combative mistress.
Michiko Egami
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Eiko
A diary of an office lady.
Pinku from 1972.
Chie Morikawa
For a girl who works in a 3rd rate bar, Ayuko is full of vanity. Nomura, her patron, is besotted by her and it is their habit that they cannot reach a climax unless they peek at a couple, across the way, making love. Intent on climbing up in the world, Ayuko uses all her wiles to get her patron, who is putty in her hands, to move her from her grubby apartment house to a dreamboat of a place. She then tries to find a place to work more befitting her new home but all the elite night clubs will have nothing to do with her and with time heavy on her hands, the devil finds mischief for idle hands to do.
Saeko Hinatsu
Roman Porno from 1972.
Akane
The great Daimyo enlists the aid of the three Shadow Hunters in ensuring the delivery of an illegal cannon in this sequel to Toshio Masuda's bloody adaptation of the manga by Takao Saito. Despite the Shadow Hunters's remarkable skill, this mission is no walk in the park, and in order to survive they must face a relentless army of ninjas and female warriors willing to sacrifice their lives to disrupt the delivery and claim the cannon for themselves.
Yumi Nakazawa / Yoko
Nikkatsu Roman Porno
Ritsuko Kamisaka
Pinku from 1972.
Pinku from 1972.
A critique of the ideal Japanese family, here seen as militaristic, absurdly incestuous and patriarchal. And only nihilistic destruction by the young ones seems to be the only way out.
