Jun Arai

Toshie, a young, conservative secretary-typist has fallen in love with Shozo Narita, a young man she has met through her work.

An aging geisha, whose angry teenage son is ashamed of her profession, works alongside a young geisha, resentful of her family for forcing her into a life of ignominy.

A middle-aged father has just married off his third daughter, but still has his nine year old son to raise whom he resents as he was unwanted.

Three couples connected to rival business and theatrical families navigate complicated romances, workplace disputes, and family opposition.

A man who works late hours at a deadening job lives together with his wife and his younger sister. The younger sister's a modern girl who's starting to receive romantic attention from one of her co-workers.

In Depression-era Tokyo, the life of a single mother and her young son are disrupted by the return of her ex-husband, who fathered the child and walked out on her years earlier.

Hiroshi Chida harbored secret feelings for Yuriko, a nurse at his father Yasuhiro's hospital. As fate would have it, Yuriko winds up marrying Hiroshi's father.

"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.

A modern girl suddenly intrudes into a widower's family home.

The three-hour Ai yo jinrui to tomo ni are / Love, Be with Humanity (1931) starts as a satire of alienation in the world of money, develops into a lumberland epic with a forest fire on Sakhalin Island, turns into a tragedy of King Lear dimensions, and manages to amaze the blasé audience with a happy end in the Wild West.

Japanese silent film from 1926. (Obo-chan meaning "Young Master.") Written by Ayame Mizushima, the first female screenwriter in Japan.

Part two of Shimizu's major silent Seven Seas, a family drama of the intertwining fates of the rich, decadent Yagibashis and the far less prosperous Sone family.

The film is a lengthy work interweaving characters from different backgrounds and social strata in a narrative centered around the experiences of its heroine, Yumie Sone. Over two hours long, Seven Seas was released theatrically in two parts, with the first part entitled "Virginity Chapter" coming out in December 1931, while the second part, "Chastity Chapter," followed in March 1932. Near the beginning of the narrative, at a garden party given by the wealthy Yagibashi family in Tokyo, Yumie meets Takehiko, the Yagibashis' playboy son and the brother of Yumie's fiancé, Yuzuru. Yumie, a young middle-class woman, lives with her ailing father, a retired ministry official, an older sister, and a younger sister still a child (played by a very young Hideko Takamine). Takehiko, who has just returned from a trip to Europe, is attracted to Yumie and contrives to have her stay overnight at his family's mansion where he takes advantage of her.

Japanese silent film from 1928, co-starring Chojiro Hayashi and up-and-coming actress Kinuyo Tanaka.

This 1932 adaptation is the earliest sound version of the ever-popular and much-filmed Chushingura story of the loyal 47 retainers who avenged their feudal lord after he was obliged to commit hara-kiri due to the machinations of a villainous courtier. As the first sound version of the classic narrative, the film was something of an event, and employed a stellar cast, who give a roster of memorable performances. Director Teinosuke Kinugasa was primarily a specialist in jidai-geki (period films), such as the internationally celebrated Gate of Hell (Jigokumon, 1953), and although he is now most famous as the maker of the avant-garde silent films A Page of Madness (Kurutta ichipeji, 1926) and Crossroads (Jujiro, 1928), Chushingura is in fact more typical of his output than those experimental works. The film ranked third in that year’s Kinema Junpo critics’ poll, and Joseph Anderson and Donald Richie noted that 'not only the sound but the quick cutting was admired by many critics.

Record of Love and Desire a.k.a. Desire of Night (愛慾の記[b], Aiyoku no ki; lit. "Memories of Love and Desire") is a 1930 Japanese silent film directed by Heinosuke Gosho, starring Kinuyo Tanaka and Ichirō Yuki.

Heinosuke Gosho evokes in this film the family conflicts engendered by the eternal problem of a father who projects his professional desires on the life of his son. The sister Machiko is the essential link that will allow everyone to apologize to each other and achieve reconciliation.

The three-hour Ai yo jinrui to tomo ni are / Love, Be with Humanity (1931) starts as a satire of alienation in the world of money, develops into a lumberland epic with a forest fire on Sakhalin Island, turns into a tragedy of King Lear dimensions, and manages to amaze the blasé audience with a happy end in the Wild West.

Japanese silent film from 1928.

Japanese silent film from 1930. Directed by Heinosuke Gosho, the film marked a new stage in the artistry of Kinuyo Tanaka, earning acclaim strong enough to greatly expand her following as a leading actress.

Because of her husband’s suicide, a young widow finds herself suddenly cast into a life of solitude, with only her beloved child in her arms. At first, her pure devotion is directed toward the memory of her late husband, but before long it transforms into a fierce, consuming love for her child. That very love, however, drives her onto a perilous path, leading inexorably toward the tragic fate of a doomed flower. Ah, Mother! For what sin must you endure the scourge of the world? This work is offered in silence and reverence—above all to mothers everywhere. [Adapted from the promotional poster.]

Japanese film from 1933, adapted from Masao Kume's serialized newspaper novel.

Otoku asks her brother Bunkichi to speak with her son Seiichi, a young man for whom sacrificed everything but who now seems to be headed for a wastrel life. Bunkichi admonishes the boy to study harder, but it seems his uncle's advice may already be too late.