Yuya Ishii

The Real You

Why had a mother who seemed happy desired to end her own life? Desperate to uncover his mother’s true intentions, Sakuya ventures into uncharted technological territory. He turns to VF (Virtual Figure), a technology that aggregates personal data from one’s life to create a “human” in a virtual space.

Our Family

The emotional journey of a four-member family that fails to recognize that it is rapidly growing apart until the mother is diagnosed with terminal cancer.

To Walk Beside You

A 17-year-old country boy named Norio decides his only option is to follow his late parents’ example and commit suicide. After failing even at that, his 34-year-old English teacher Akemi convinces him that he should instead move to Tokyo with her and become a lawyer on her dime. Unfortunately, Akemi doesn’t have quite as much money as she leads Norio to believe, and has to secretly get a job at a karaoke bar under the guise of “going to the salon”. Meanwhile, she continuously prods her somewhat dimwitted student to work harder toward her manufactured goal of him becoming a lawyer. Although Norio is falling in love with Akemi, he’s not all that interested in studying, and matters only get worse when he discovers his benefactor’s secret source of income.

Hito wa Naze Love Letter wo Kaku no ka

A woman writes a letter to a young man, leading to a correspondence with his father that unveils the truth of a 24-year-old high school romance, his son's death, and the power of love letters.

The Secret Battlefield

In April 1941, months before the Pacific War begins, Japan’s brightest young elites, bureaucrats, military officers, and civilians, are secretly assembled at the Total War Research Institute. Tasked with simulating a conflict against the United States, they confront harsh realities through intense analysis.

The Great Passage

Majime, an eccentric man in publishing company, who has unique ability of words, joins the team that will compile a new dictionary, The Great Passage. In the eclectic team, he becomes immersed in the world of dictionaries. But the team is overwhelmed with problems.

Of Monster Mode

A young man in a green Martian costume allows himself to be dragged hither and thither by a bossy housewife. In this way the film swerves between deceptively ordinary realism and a fantastic absurdism. The housewife Junko (Otori Rei) has started to behave increasingly strangely since the death of her son. Her husband can't put up with it any more and goes off with a female colleague. The man in the green suit, Katsura Tombo (Oda Yonosuke), is a bread salesman but he forgets his work. His strange costume is supposed to lure new customers, but he seems to have forgotten that. He is more or less kidnapped by Junko and falls in love with her. Junko however has other intentions with the rather naive salesman. The failed Martian drives her around in his aunt's van, but his helpfulness doesn't get rewarded.

Girl Sparks

Saeko is a normal schoolgirl who just happen to witness two rockets collide in the sky one day. Finally, this is something out of the ordinary. She attends school, but it is dull. Life is boring. The teacher has other things on his mind. Her father stinks. Her father's factory is going broke. Perhaps she can save it. That would be something different.

The Real You

Why had a mother who seemed happy desired to end her own life? Desperate to uncover his mother’s true intentions, Sakuya ventures into uncharted technological territory. He turns to VF (Virtual Figure), a technology that aggregates personal data from one’s life to create a “human” in a virtual space.

Our Family

The emotional journey of a four-member family that fails to recognize that it is rapidly growing apart until the mother is diagnosed with terminal cancer.

To Walk Beside You

A 17-year-old country boy named Norio decides his only option is to follow his late parents’ example and commit suicide. After failing even at that, his 34-year-old English teacher Akemi convinces him that he should instead move to Tokyo with her and become a lawyer on her dime. Unfortunately, Akemi doesn’t have quite as much money as she leads Norio to believe, and has to secretly get a job at a karaoke bar under the guise of “going to the salon”. Meanwhile, she continuously prods her somewhat dimwitted student to work harder toward her manufactured goal of him becoming a lawyer. Although Norio is falling in love with Akemi, he’s not all that interested in studying, and matters only get worse when he discovers his benefactor’s secret source of income.

Hito wa Naze Love Letter wo Kaku no ka

A woman writes a letter to a young man, leading to a correspondence with his father that unveils the truth of a 24-year-old high school romance, his son's death, and the power of love letters.

The Secret Battlefield

In April 1941, months before the Pacific War begins, Japan’s brightest young elites, bureaucrats, military officers, and civilians, are secretly assembled at the Total War Research Institute. Tasked with simulating a conflict against the United States, they confront harsh realities through intense analysis.

The Great Passage

Majime, an eccentric man in publishing company, who has unique ability of words, joins the team that will compile a new dictionary, The Great Passage. In the eclectic team, he becomes immersed in the world of dictionaries. But the team is overwhelmed with problems.

Of Monster Mode

A young man in a green Martian costume allows himself to be dragged hither and thither by a bossy housewife. In this way the film swerves between deceptively ordinary realism and a fantastic absurdism. The housewife Junko (Otori Rei) has started to behave increasingly strangely since the death of her son. Her husband can't put up with it any more and goes off with a female colleague. The man in the green suit, Katsura Tombo (Oda Yonosuke), is a bread salesman but he forgets his work. His strange costume is supposed to lure new customers, but he seems to have forgotten that. He is more or less kidnapped by Junko and falls in love with her. Junko however has other intentions with the rather naive salesman. The failed Martian drives her around in his aunt's van, but his helpfulness doesn't get rewarded.

Girl Sparks

Saeko is a normal schoolgirl who just happen to witness two rockets collide in the sky one day. Finally, this is something out of the ordinary. She attends school, but it is dull. Life is boring. The teacher has other things on his mind. Her father stinks. Her father's factory is going broke. Perhaps she can save it. That would be something different.

Bare-assed Japan

Taro, who recently graduated from high school, doesn't know what he wants to do. He rents a house and plot of land in the country-side determined to make a living in agriculture. His expectation is great as the girl he likes, Yoko, will also go with him, but his father, recently laid off by his company's down-sizing, is also tagging along and so begins the the trio's strange life in the country. Set at a solitary house in the middle of the desolate, country-side, the relaxed tempo and off-hand humor are impressive despite the themes of parent-progeny conflict and reconciliation that unfold in the film.

The Asian Angel

Aoki is a failing novelist, and Sol is a failing pop singer. Encountering each other in South Korea, speaking different languages, they and their families somehow end up in a truck heading off into the Korean countryside.

The Moon

Yoko, who gets a job at a nursing home, witnesses the elderly and disabled people there having their human dignity threatened.

The Tokyo Night Sky Is Always the Densest Shade of Blue

Mika works as a nurse by day; by night she entertains covetous men at a girls' bar. Shinji is blind in one eye and ekes out a living as a construction worker. Young and grown-up at the same time, they both lead a lonely existence, but somehow their paths keep miraculously crossing under the Tokyo sky.

All the Things We Never Said

Atsuhisa lives with wife Natsumi and daughter Suzu. He and friend Takeda study languages to become businessmen. When Natsumi reveals an affair and wants divorce, their lives change.

Mitsuko Delivers

Mitsuko is 24, heavily pregnant and estranged from the American father of her child. Her parents believe she is happy and successful in America and are unaware that she has secretly returned to Tokyo. Making the biggest decisions on the slightest whim, she moves back into the tenement street where she lived as a child. The move changes lives, reignites old romances and creates a supportive circle of love that may be exactly what Mitsuko needs.

The Vancouver Asahi

In pre-WWII Vancouver, second-generation Japanese immigrants had it tough. Daily, they faced discrimination, hatred and injustice at the hands of their Caucasian counterparts. But one thing made their lives worth living: baseball. They may be the underdogs, but the Vancouver Asahi baseball team have a sense of fair play and smart tactics that set them apart from the brute force of their opponents. Under the guidance of new team captain Reggie Kasahara, can they be able to rise above all the negativity to win the tournament? This film is based on the true story of Vancouver Asahi, the Japanese-Canadian baseball team that was inducted into The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 2003.

Uta Monogatari: Cinema Fighters Project

Six Stories based on Six Songs.

A Madder Red

7 years ago, Yoichi died in a traffic accident. His wife Ryoko did not receive compensation from her husband's death. She has since raised her son Junpei by herself. Junpei is now a middle school student. Ryoko also cares for her father-in-law, who lives in a nursing home and she also runs a cafe. Her care is in a difficult situation due to Covid-19, while Junpei experiences bullying at school.

The World of Machida-kun

High school boy Machida is a loner who is not particularly good at his studies or extracurricular activities. He does seem to have his heart in the right place however. When he is injured at school instead of the school nurse at the infirmary a school-mate tends to him. He develops a crush for her and soon enough the feelings are returned.

Masked Hearts

26 years old Hanako is on the verge of directing her first-ever feature film, achieving her childhood dream. Although she’s being hindered by an older male assistant director, she has a fateful encounter with a man named Masao, and her life at last begins to take on a whole new luster. However, the underhanded actions of an unscrupulous producer cause Hanako to have her personal project stolen. After being dumped into despair, she quietly stokes her rage, and makes a pledge to keep fighting, and never back down! Entangling Masao, her hopeless father and two older brothers (who she’s been out of touch with for over 10 years) in her obsessive quest, Hanako audaciously attempts to make her dream come true, her way!

A Man with Style

Miyata lost his wife early on and single-handedly raised their two children. One day he notices a change in his physical condition, and decides that it must be stomach cancer.

Sawako Decides

After 5 years in Tokyo, 5 part-time jobs, 5 boyfriends, Sawako's life is going nowhere. When her father gets seriously ill, she has to take over his struggling factory. Gradually she becomes the decider of her own life.

When a Tree Falls

A young couple is devastated when their son is killed by a falling tree during a windstorm. As the distraught father begins to look for answers into his son’s death, what appears to be a tragic accident turns out to have been the result of multiple blunders by multiple people.

Rebel, Jiro's Love

Jiro is a chubby and clumsy young man who is very unhappy about his appearance. He has difficulty finding his feet and it is certainly beyond his ability to find a girlfriend. At a certain point he falls in love...

House of the Owl

At the height of his career and powers, Japan's master fixer, who has guided politicians and business heads through some of Japan's biggest scandals, discovers that fixing his family is harder than fixing a country.

Candy House

Sakurai Taro’s parents died young. His grandmother, Akiko, has been making great effort to protect her struggling candy store, Sakuraya, in the old part of Tokyo, but it's not easy. Taro eats candy with regular customers such as chilhood friend Saegusa Hiroki who aspires to be a scriptwriter, and talk nonsense, like in their youth. However, they realize this unfettered, comfortable existence will end some day with the passage of time. Then Taro’s ex-classmate, Kimura Reiko, comes back home with her son after a divorce. He and his friends start to notice what is truly important to them as they face up to their pasts, dreams and pains.