Ditch

Libido

After an elderly man is discharged from a hospital following a misunderstood, life-affirming impulse toward a fellow patient, he finds himself caught between his wife’s empathy and his children’s judgmental scorn. As his health wavers, he and his wife attempt to reclaim their intimacy and vitality during a seaside getaway, even as their son becomes entangled with the same young woman from the clinic.

Onna no issho

Based on "Une vie" by Guy de Maupassant

Before Dawn

Their Legacy

Heitaro, who had served his firm loyally for 30 years, reaches the retirement age. He has four unmarried daughters and decides to split his retirement allowance he has received from his firm into 500,000 yen for each daughter as a wedding dowry. He considers them all old enough to handle the money, and gives them a free hand to use it as they wish.

The Lowest Man

A young offender who is already guilty of many crimes is sentenced again for rape. Upon his release from prison, a year later, the victim waits to kill him.

Diary of Forsaken Love

Follows the life of Tsuru, the poor daughter of farmers in Shinshu, Japan.

Hachi: A Dog's Tale

Professor Wilson discovers a lost Akita puppy on his way home. Despite objections from his wife, Hachi endears himself to the family and grows to be Parker's loyal companion. As their bond grows deeper, a beautiful relationship unfolds.

Ryûri no kishi

Who Will Judge Me?

Directed by Senkichi Taniguchi

Hachiko

The tragic, true story about Hachikō, an Akita dog who was loyal to his master, Professor Ueno, even after Ueno's death.

Onibaba

While her son, Kichi, is away at war, a woman and her daughter-in-law survive by killing samurai who stray into their swamp, then selling whatever valuables they find. Both are devastated when they learn that Kichi has died, but his wife soon begins an affair with a neighbor who survived the war, Hachi. The mother disapproves and, when she can't steal Hachi for herself, tries to scare her daughter-in-law with a mysterious mask from a dead samurai.

Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director

In 39 interviews with actors and actresses, writers, producers and staff members, interspersed with film excerpts and stills, Shindō recounts the life and career of his friend and mentor Mizoguchi.

Ishimatsu of the Forest

The tale of a feudal swordsman who cynically takes no responsibility for anything, relegating it to others, and then taking the credit.

The Perennial Weed

A detective wonders that his sister is a murder suspect.

Owl

A mother and daughter are stranded in small, isolated cabin, and are starving to death. In order to survive, they plan to entice men that happen to stray to their cabin with sex, and kill them. All goes well until a local cop shows up and, then, an old relation.

The Dreadful

In medieval England, Anne and her domineering mother-in-law Morwen struggle to survive on the outskirts of society. But when a man from Anne's past returns from war, a curse begins to take shape through a mysterious knight and threatens to destroy them all.

Good Morning

A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of inter­generational relationships, Good Morning tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his child protagonists. Shot in stunning color and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors’ new washing machine and unemployed husbands look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy refashions Ozu’s own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.

Early Spring

A young salaryman and his wife struggle within the confines of their passionless relationship while he embarks on an extramarital affair.

House of Bamboo

Eddie Kenner is given a special assignment by the Army to get the inside story on Sandy Dawson, a former GI who has formed a gang of fellow servicemen and Japanese locals.

Madadayo

In postwar Tokyo, beloved writer-professor Hyakken Uchida retires and is buoyed through hardship by the fierce devotion of his former students, who honor him each year with a raucous “Not yet!” birthday toast. Told in warm, gently comic vignettes, Kurosawa’s farewell celebrates aging, friendship, and the sustaining ritual of teacher and pupils refusing to say goodbye.

The Idiot

A gentle, war-shattered ex-soldier, Kinji Kameda, arrives in wintry Hokkaidō and is pulled into a volatile tangle of love and pity between the disgraced Taeko Nasu, the proud Ayako, and his possessive friend Akama. Kameda’s saintly compassion exposes everyone’s wounds, steering the quartet toward jealousy, violence, and inexorable tragedy. Adapted from Dostoevsky’s novel.

Pigs and Battleships

In the city of Yokosuka, Kinta and his lover Haruko, both involved with yakuza, brave the post-occupation period with a goal to be together.

Floating Clouds

A married Japanese forester during WWII is sent to Indochina to manage forests. He meets a young Japanese typist and promises to leave his wife. He doesn't and after the war, she turns up and the affair resumes.

Tokyo Twilight

Two sisters learn about the existence of their long-lost biological mother, but the younger is unable to accept the fact that she was abandoned as a child.

Little Amélie or the Character of Rain

The world is a perplexing, peaceful mystery to Amélie until a miraculous encounter with chocolate ignites her wild sense of curiosity. As she develops a deep attachment to her family's housekeeper, Nishio-san, Amélie discovers the wonders of nature as well as the emotional truths hidden beneath the surface of her family's idyllic life as foreigners in post-war Japan.

Early Summer

In postwar Tokyo, Noriko lives with her extended family. Although she enjoys her career and her social life, her more traditional family worries about her single marital status at the advanced age of 28. 40-year-old business associate Takako proposes, Noriko's family press her into accepting, but when her widowed childhood friend Kenkichi returns to the neighborhood, she finds her heart leading in another direction.

Gate of Flesh

In the shady black markets and bombed-out hovels of post–World War II Tokyo, a tough band of prostitutes eke out a dog-eat-dog existence, maintaining tenuous friendships and a semblance of order in a world of chaos. But when a renegade ex-soldier stumbles into their midst, lusts and loyalties clash, with tragic results. With Gate of Flesh, visionary director Seijun Suzuki delivers a whirlwind of social critique and pulp drama, shot through with brilliant colors and raw emotions.

Cruel Story of Youth

A harsh young man seduces a freeloading young woman and eventually takes advantage of her knack for hitchhiking to rob middle-class men.