Toshiko Itô

The Way of Drama unfolds in the world of kabuki in Osaka, but also addresses the politics of popular culture and the rivalry between theatrical styles like those used by amateur actors to dramatise contemporary events.

A 1943 film.

This epic depicts the battle between Uesugi Kenshin and Takeda Shingen. The focus of the story is the struggle by the unit leader in charge of the main supply wagons and the supply troops to transport materiel to the Uesugi army. To this are added episodes involving an itinerant woman.

1941 Toho adaptation of Natsume's novel.

The year is 1936. Ôhinata-mura was a very poor village between deep valleys. Soncho, the village head is trying to collect the village taxes from the villagers but he knows full well that no one can afford to pay the village tax which has been unpaid for years...

Based on an autobiographical story by Toyota Masako.

A half brother and sister work at a hotel in Hakone respectively as a porter and a souvenir shop clerk. They are close. One day a woman named Hasegawa checks into the hotel in order to recuperate in a calm environment with fresh air. She is the mother of the store employee. The mother and daughter were separated due to the Kanto earthquake. The girl was practically raised by her older half brother.

Part 2 of a 2-part romance (fist part - Kafuku zempen) based on a story by noted author Kikuchi Kan. In the second half, we discover that Toyomi is pregnant -- and while Shintaro and Yurie are on their extended honeymoon, she bears his child, a girl named Kiyoko. She is supported in adversity by Michiko -- and gets considerable moral support from not only her own mother but also from Shintaro's mother and siblings. Even more surprisingly, Yurie strikes up a friendship of sorts with her. When Yurie learns that the child is Shintaro's, she convinces Toyomi that it would be best to let Shintaro (and her) raise Kiyoko, so Toyomi can get on with making a proper life for herself. Tearfully, Toyomi agrees. Sometime later, Michiko goes to visit Toyomi -- and sees her at work, as a kindergarten teacher.

Based on an original story by Yojiro Ishizaka, this well-made drama is set in a Christian school in a beautiful northern harbor town. Teacher Masaki (Obinata) speaks up for Keiko, one of the girls at the school, every time she causes problems because he feels sorry for her, a child born out of wedlock. Sumi (Natsukawa), one of Masaki’s colleagues and who is secretly in love with him, strongly disagrees with him about Keiko. Then Sumi hears a rumor that Keiko is pregnant with Masaki's child . . . .

Part 1 of a 2-part romance based on a story by noted author Kikuchi Kan. The central character here is Toyomi (played by Takako IRIE, star of Mizoguchi’s "Water Magician), a rich young woman in love with Shintaro (Minoru TAKADA), a rich young man. Unfortunately, Shintaro’s father is in the process of arranging a marriage for him with Yurie (Chieko TAKEHISA), the scion of an even wealthier family. In order to avoid this, the two young lovers flee to Tokyo to live together. When Shintaro comes back to proclaim his intent to marry Toyomi, his father browbeats him into attending the long-arranged marriage meeting with Yurie. While Shintaro is back home, Toyomi goes on a vacation trip with her closest chum, Michiko (Yumeko AIZOME). At a class reunion, Toyomi is to distressed (at not having heard from Shintaro for so long), she doesn’t go out on the town with her classmates. Michiko, however, runs into Shintaro and Yurie (also out on the town), and pulling him aside, demands an explanation.

The prewar film Haha no kyoku (Mother's Melody, 1937) is known for its place in Japanese film history as one of the top three melodramas as well as for its authorship: Yamamoto Satsuo is an auteur not usually associated with filming melodramas. Yamamoto made the film right after he moved, along with his mentor Naruse Mikio, to the Toho film company. A number of subsequent postwar mother's films adopted some of its essences, making it a genre-defining moment in Japanese cinema. This great melodrama is atypical of Yamamoto's output, much of which deals with political corruption and inequities within social institutions and offers a strong anti-establishment appeal.

A story of two sisters, the older being more traditional, the younger a "moga" ("modern girl"). Their widowed father runs the family sake shop, but is running into financial trouble, causing him to tamper with his stock; Meanwhile, his long-time mistress yearns for something more serious. Amidst this, the older sister is introduced to a well-off suitor: A university boy, much more intrigued by the less traditional little sister. A doddering grandfather, an officious uncle and busybody neighbors also don't make the lives of the hardworking members of the family any easier.

Kimiko, a Tokyo white-collar working girl, lives with her serious, intellectual, haiku-writing mother. Kimiko seeks to marry her boyfriend but needs her absent father to act as the go-between and negotiate the marriage. Kimiko travels and finds her father living with a second family.

1935 P.C.L. adaptation of Natsume's novel.