The House of Wooden Blocks

Ken Ogata plays Shiro Miyagi, a sprinter with Olympic aspirations whose dreams were shattered by WWII. A broken man, he leads the dissolute life of a gigolo until a chance meeting with a fiery young athlete named Hiroko (Michiyo Yasuda). Realizing that she has talent as a sprinter, Miyagi sees a second chance at Olympic glory in becoming her coach. Following Miyagi’s unconventional, military-style training, Hiroko sets a record for the 100-meter dash, but her greatest hurdle proves to be a “sex check” which all professional athletes must pass.

A man operates a small real estate business near Osaka. A man from Tokyo asks for help in buying a large tract of land in order, he says, to build an automobile factory. But by accident the realtor learns that the Tokaido Railway Line is going to be built directly across the land just acquired. Also known as Black Super Express

When Ryoko, a ballerina turned disco dancer, gets entangled in a murder and a stolen 10 million yen, she must race against time to uncover the truth and return to her hometown.

Ichikawa's 1956 adaptation of Nihonbashi was the first to take the work of Kyoka Izumi— until then regarded as a writer of common tragic melodramas—and re-evaluate it as a tanbi-ha work of decadence, aestheticism, and intrigue. Ichikawa's film presents the tragic plot of the young geisha who is unable to enact her love for a man publicly in any way other than a histrionic story of torment, a heart-rending tale of lovers being crushed by fate. Instead, Ichikawa shows the contest of wills that transpires as two geisha, Oko and Kiyoha fight for the top spot in Nihonbashi, the pinnacle of the Tokyo geisha world. Nihonbashi is an elegant, if steely, exposition of manners. The young doctor, Shinzo Katsuragi, is the object of affection for both women, but appears to be more the choice reward for the plotting and thieving of these two early modern superwomen, than a lover they swoon over.

Follows five sex workers employed at a Japanese brothel while the nation debates the passage of an anti-prostitution law.

In 1939, Sakura Nishi is a young army nurse who is sent to the field hospitals in China during the Sino-Japanese war. She has to assist the surgeon Dr. Okabe with an incredible number of amputations. In the crowded wards, she gives sympathy to some of the soldiers, including sexually servicing one who has lost both arms and has no hope of returning home. She falls in love with Dr. Okabe, and follows him to the front, even though he is impotent from his morphine addiction.

Based on Kaoru Morimoto oft performed 1945 play, a starring vehicle for famed actress Machiko Kyo as Kei an abused orphaned girl that eventually finds sanctuary with a wealthy family that trades goods with China and becomes a successful businesswoman. Masumura dilutes the originally intended pro-Japan propaganda elements for a more anti-war approach.

After a random encounter at a bar, two couples collide. Two men, two women, embroiled in a love-and-hate drama that threatens to engulf them. The sexual anxiety between the interwoven couples tautens right up to the nearly unbearable tension of the climax...

On the eve of the Russo-Japanese war at the beginning of the 20th century, small-town girl Okane has married an old wealthy man to escape a life of poverty.

Nishi is an advertising executive for a caramel company that is planning to launch a new product, in fierce competition with two other companies.

Two car manufacturers spy on each other to try to find out details and prices of a new sports car each is about to launch.

Yuko is sent to the coastal regions to be raised away from the rest of her sophisticated family where she finds out from her ill grandmother that she is not who she thought she was.

A track and field athlete falls in love with a cop. After being paralyzed by a bullet from a detective investigating her father's crimes, a high school sprinter finds unexpected love and navigates a web of family secrets and forbidden love.

Otsuya, the daughter of a rich merchant, elopes with her lover Shinsuke, an employee of her father's. During their flight, Otsuya's beauty attracts the gaze of Seikichi, a mysterious master tattooist who sees her pristine white skin as the perfect canvas for his art. The image of the large demonic spider that he emblazons across Otsuya's back marks her as the property of another man, radically altering her relationships with all around her as her personality seems to transform under its influence.

In 8th-century China, the Emperor grieves the death of his wife. The Yang family wants to provide the Emperor with a consort so that they may consolidate their court influence. General An Lushan finds a distant relative working in their kitchen, whom they groom to present to the Emperor. The Emperor falls in love and she becomes the Princess Yang Kwei-fei. The Yangs are then appointed important ministers, though An Lushan is not given the court position he covets.

A youth drama set in a Japanese university which is home to a group of active, leftist students.