Den Obinata

A young man rents an apartment in Tokyo and discover it was built by his father. He falls in love with the daughter of the mistress of the house and decides to marry her. Only to discover that his father is is in debt and wants him to marry Ranko so that she may help his company by granting 1.5 million yen. Teruko decides to borrow money from a greedy bar owner who lends her money on certain conditions and photographs her without her consent. A love traingle forms between Koroku, Ranko, and Teruko. Things complicate when Koroku marries Teruko and Tsugawa threatens them for the money causing many twists and turns.

When a young woman is named as the prime suspect in a murder, her girlfriend and her girlfriend's boyfriend set out to prove her innocence. Their investigation leads them to an isolated, creepy house in the middle of nowhere, where sinister goings-on abound.

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 . . . .

Deep down, a dark shadow always lingered in the heart of Ushio, a young prosecutor who had made a name for himself by cracking down on organized crime. In the bribery case involving his old college friend Ayao, he had sought a two-year prison sentence in accordance with the law. Ayao took his own life, and his family was torn apart by the world’s persecution.

This film attempts to reconstruct the tension of the Battle of Shanghai through an episode in an understated way, introducting its story in a documentary mode. In the film story, Japan's marine regiment protects Japanese residents and Chinese refugees-women and young children-from rampant street fighting, Shanhai Rikusentai unsparingly uses its first eight minutes for an official-mannered self-justification of the war. From the viewpoint of explaining Japan's military operation,the narration refers to the city s spatial division in sync with maps on screen.

Following the accidental death of a logging boss in the Kiso mountains, a local thug pressures the boss's daughter into marriage. When the boss's new foreman arrives to protect her, a trio of clumsy but loyal lumberjack friends hatch a series of schemes to defeat the thug's gang and secure the couple's union.

In Depression-era Tokyo, a struggling middle-aged single father with a young son comes across a homeless young lady and convinces a bar owner to take her in.

What is marriage? Young couple in match-making wanted to know before they decide. They visited married couples of sisters and brothers. Love comedy in 1942.

Part one of two.

This is the only surviving "Mito Komon Manyu-ki" film. This release also known as Adrift Tour Memoir is an 80-minute compilation of the first and second parts (147 minutes), which were re-edited and screened at a time when presentable films were dried up immediately after the defeat of the war.

A newly hired daily newspaper writer covering the society beat receives an assignment to cover Tokyo at night by walking and observing it. He gets into the right frame of mind by dressing the part as a vagrant with not a penny to his name. He gets into trouble ending up at the police station slammer overnight. He has no material to write about and, with his assignment unfulfilled, faces a cross editor.

A group of men obsessed with oil gather in a remote oil field region. Ichiro Kitazawa (Tatsuzaki) was one of them. He had a daughter-in-law named Harue Saijo (Takasugi), but he felt no affection for her. Ichiro, however, had spent the inheritance Harue had inherited from her father to find oil. Ichiro was now being bled by Butterfly (Hidaka), an eccentric female waitress at the Kinryu-tei. Harue took a train one day to visit Ichiro. She then befriended a man called Ken Matsuki (Dainikata), who had saved her from a crisis. Matsuki was a friend of Kitazawa, a man who was also passionate about the oil search.

Keitaro is a law student and Yaeko is a high school girl. They are neighbors, and their friendship is starting to develop into something more romantic. Then, Yaeko's sister Kyouko has a breakup with her husband and returns home. Kyouko is clearly interested in Keitaro and Yae becomes anxious.

"The Dancing Girl of Izu" tells of the story between a young male student who is touring the Izu Peninsula and a family of traveling dancers he meets there, including their youngest girl. The student finds the naïve girl attractive even though he eventually has to part with the family after spending memorable time together.

An early Japanese sound film, notable for being the only Japanese film ever to use the Western Electric Sound System. Contrary to most Western sources that give sole directing credit to Eizo Tanaka, it was actually co-directed by six different directors, Tanaka, Kazue Kimura, Kazuo Takimura, Ryoji Mikami and Hidekuni Ouchi.

1948 adaptation of Golden Devil, part 2

In 1937 fighting erupted between Japanese and Chinese troops at the Marco Polo Bridge. A team of Japanese spies broadcasting radio programs to promote pro-Japanese sentiment were searching for a Chinese speaking announcer. Only 53 minutes of the film survives.

The deputy shogun of the realm, accompanied by his loyal and capable aides, makes a stop at Jigokudani, a place along his journey through various provinces. Here, a lively and entertaining tale unfolds, filled with swordplay where heroes and villains clash, intertwined with heartwarming humor.

The film was produced during Second Sino-Japanese War, before the Pearl Harbor Attack in 1941. The film mainly concerns the training of newly-recruited pilots and their daily life, then their subsequent fighting experiences in China. Army supported the production, providing all the authentic airplanes, training and actual actions. They even provided the older biplanes disguised as Chinese fighter planes. Obinata plays the trainer-turned-combat-leader, who is passionate and cool at the same time. All his boys love him, of course. The film is not as intense, full of sugar-coated camaraderie, until young pilots are killed in action one by one. Last twenty minutes are fairly grim, as the message of self-sacrifice is heard loud and clear.