A criminal syndicate wants detective Onihei dead, but the resolute hero proves to be hard to kill.
Ikkan, the Priest
At the invitation of the Japanese Ministry of Education, the former “mountain filmer” Fanck directed this “cultural feature film” with Japanese actors in Japan, making this the first, German-Japanese co-production. The young Japanese man Teruo gets caught up in a conflict between tradition and modernism, when he returns to Japan from Germany after having spent a number of years there studying. Now, he is supposed to marry Mitsuko, the daughter of his adoptive father, to whom Teruo has long been promised. But Teruo, who has gotten to know the freedoms of the western world, would rather marry the woman he loves and behaves brusquely to Mitsuko.
Directed by Daisuke Itō.
Yasube, owner of cheap lodging
The Japanese equivalent of penny dreadfuls glorifying Jesse James, A Diary of Chuji’s Travels gives a unique gloss to the tale of Chuji Kunisada, the legendary bakuto (or gambler, the precursors to modern-day yakuza). One of the two remaining segments of Ito’s original four-hour trilogy, it depicts Chuji’s attempt to save the geisha Oshina, a rebellion against the rigid social structure of Edo Japan. With socialist overtones, it’s a passionate artifact of early Japanese film.
A Diary of Chuji's Travels is a silent Japanese jidaigeki made in 1927 starring Denjirō Ōkōchi and directed by Daisuke Itō. It was originally released in three parts, all of which were long thought to be lost until portions of the second part and much of the third part were discovered and restored in 1991. Since the film had once been voted in a 1959 Kinema Junpō poll as the best Japanese film of all time, its discovery was significant. At the time of its release, Itō was the leader of a new style of samurai films that featured outlaw heroes and fast-cut sword fighting scenes.
Directed by Kensaku Suzuki.
An old potter despairs of having only two daughters and no son, hoping his apprentice will one day bring him an heir. The apprentice meets the eldest daughter but is disgusted by her. He decides to marry the younger daughter, who is in love with another man.
