In Search of Mother

Great Bodhisattva Pass

1930s Japanese film.

Taiko's Rising in the World

Taikoki is a legendary biography of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who rose to the office of taikō. And the story of this film is about the rise to power of Toyotomi Hideyoshi from a farmer's son.

Life of a Country Doctor

A skilled country doctor's talents are such that he can even perform operations as difficult and novel as removing a patient's kidney for the first time in Japan. Unfortunately for him, however, his wife's addiction to gambling is of such a magnitude that he is down to selling his underwear to make money. The image sticks and he becomes known as the 'underwear doctor.' On the other hand, his successful surgery's patient is so grateful he himself wants to become a physician.

Kojiro

Sasaki Kojiro tells the story of the genius who staked his love, glory, and life on a duel with the supreme master of the sword, Miyamoto Musashi (Tatsuya Nakadai). Oscar winning Hiroshi Inagaki directs this epic motion picture based on Genzo Murakami’s fascinating story. Despite his humble birth, the orphan Sasaki Kojiro (Onoe Kikunosuke) is determined to become the foremost swordsman in all Japan, a title that traditionally belongs to a nobleman. At fencing school, young Kojiro receives the contempt of his classmates because of his superior swordsmanship. When rumors of the upcoming civil war between Toyotomi and Tokugawa clans spread, Kojiro leaves the school and sets out, seizing every opportunity to realize his dream.

Daredevil in the Castle

During the raging war between the Toyotomi and Tokugawa clans, the swordsman Mohei (whose family has been completely decimated) is recruited by Toyotomi to overcome the seat of power, Osaka Castle. Mohei's daredevil skills will be put to severe tests.

Samurai Banners

Kansuke Yamamoto is a samurai who dreams of a country united, peaceful from sea to sea. He enters the service of Takeda, the lord of Kai domain. He convinces Takeda to kill the lord of neighboring Suwa and take his wife as a concubine. He then convinces the widow, Princess Yu, to accept this arrangement and to bear Takeda a son. He pledges them his life. He then spends years using treachery, poetic sensibility, military and political strategy to expand Takeda's realm, advance the claim of Yu's son as the heir, and prepare for an ultimate battle with the forces of Echigo. Has Kansuke overreached? Are his dreams, blinded by love, too big?

The Rickshaw Man

A poor rickshaw driver finds himself helping a young woman and her son after the woman's husband dies suddenly.

Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple

After years on the road establishing his reputation as Japan's greatest fencer, Takezo returns to Kyoto. Otsu waits for him, yet he has come not for her but to challenge the leader of the region's finest school of fencing. To prove his valor and skill, he walks deliberately into ambushes set up by the school's followers.

Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island

A humble and simple Takezo abandons his life as a knight errant. He's sought as a teacher and vassal by Shogun, Japan's most powerful clan leader. He's also challenged to fight by the supremely confident and skillful Sasaki Kojiro. Takezo agrees to fight Kojiro in a year's time but rejects Shogun's patronage, choosing instead to live on the edge of a village, raising vegetables. He's followed there by Otsu and later by Akemi, both in love with him. The year ends as Takezo assists the villagers against a band of brigands. He seeks Otsu's forgiveness and accepts her love, then sets off across the water to Ganryu Island for his final contest.

Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto

Struggling to elevate himself from his low caste in 17th century Japan, Miyamoto trains to become a mighty samurai warrior.

Chûshingura

After their lord is tricked into committing ritual suicide, forty-seven samurai warriors await the chance to avenge their master and reclaim their honor.

Children Hand in Hand

A small-town boy with a learning disability attempts to fit in with his classmates.

Blood Spilled at Takadanobaba

The tale of Nakayama Yasubei’s duel is famous, even if he in reality probably did not cut down 18 opponents. The story has been related in film, rakugo, kodan and on stage many times, in part because Nakayama later joined the famous 47 Ronin (Chushingura) as Horibe Yasubei. But Makino and Inagaki’s version gives no hint of this more serious future, playing up the thrills and the comedy with Bando’s bravura performance. The multiple pans of Yasubei running to the duel are an exemplar of the experimental flourishes of 1930s Japanese cinema and the final duel, performed virtually like a dance number, is a marker of Makino’s love of rhythm and one of the best sword fights in Japanese film history. The film was originally released under the title Chikemuri Takadanoba (Bloody Takadanobaba) with a length of 57 minutes, but suffered some cuts and a title change when it was re-released in 1952.

Samurai Saga

Edmund Rostand's play Cyrano de Bergerac, transplanted to Japan. A poet-warrior with an oversized nose (matched only by his great heart) loves a lady. But she sees him only as a friend, so he helps another man to woo her by giving him the poetry of his own heart.

Incident at Blood Pass

In the Edo period, a nameless ronin accepts an assignment to go to a mountain pass and wait. Near the pass he stops at an inn where a collection of characters gather, including a gang set on stealing shogunate gold that's soon to come over the pass. When the Ronin's assignment becomes clear, to help the gang, he's ordered to kill the inn's residents, including a woman he's rescued from an abusive husband. He's reluctant to murder innocent people; then he learns that the gold shipment is a trap and he's part of a double cross. How he sorts through these divided loyalties tests of his samurai honor, and perhaps of his love for a woman.

Shinsengumi: Assassins of Honor

Near the end of the nineteenth century, as the balance of power shifts from Shogunate towards the Emperor, Japan restlessly awaits the dawning of a new age. But not all are content...The Shinsengumi, a small army of samurai, farmers and peasants, band together to do battle against the tide of history. Their leader, Isami Kondo is a man who rises from farmer to fighter to head the fierce Shinsengumi brigade. Using a stern hand and a heart of gold, he rallies his men in defense of the tottering Shogunate. But bloodshed and treachery lurk around every corner.

Midaq Alley

Heated tempers, frustrated desires and dashed hopes plague a diverse group of individuals whose lives cross paths in Mexico City. There is the bar-owner's son, Chava, who yearns to emigrate to America. A poor barber, Abel, is madly in love with the gorgeous Alma, who eventually becomes a high-class prostitute. Finally, there is Susanita, the desperate spinster who pursues many love affairs in hopes of finding a husband.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon

Forks, Washington resident Bella Swan is reeling from the departure of her vampire love, Edward Cullen, and finds comfort in her friendship with Jacob Black, a werewolf. But before she knows it, she's thrust into a centuries-old conflict, and her desire to be with Edward at any cost leads her to take greater and greater risks.

Leave Her to Heaven

A socialite marries a prominent novelist, which spurs a violent, obsessive, and dangerous jealousy in her.

Anne of Green Gables

At the turn of the century on Prince Edward Island, Matthew Cuthbert and his sister Marilla decide to take on an orphan boy as help for their farm. But they get an unexpected jolt when they're mistakenly sent a girl instead: Anne Shirley.

The Shoes of the Fisherman

Ukrainian bishop Kiril Lakota, a political prisoner in a Soviet gulag for twenty years, is unexpectedly released and sent to the Vatican, where, upon the sudden death of the Pope, leader of the Catholic Church, he must face a challenging destiny that will put the future of the entire world in his hands.

The Letter

After a woman shoots a man to death, a damning letter she wrote raises suspicions.

A Tale of Two Cities

Set against the conditions leading up to the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror, French doctor Alexandre Manette serves an 18-year imprisonment in the Bastille in Paris, followed by his release to live in London with the daughter he has never met.

Oliver!

Musical adaptation of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist, a classic tale of an orphan who runs away from the workhouse and joins up with a group of boys headed by the Artful Dodger and trained to be pickpockets by master thief Fagin.

Iron & Blood: The Legend of Taras Bulba

Set in the 16th century, this is a story about Ukraine's Cossack warriors and their campaign to defend their lands from the advancing Polish armies.

MR-9: Do or Die

Elite Bangladeshi CIA agent Masud Rana – codename MR-9 – teams up with an American CIA operative to bring down an international criminal organization headed by a ruthless businessman.

The Banishment

While vacationing in the countryside at his childhood home, a woman suddenly reveals to her husband that she is expecting a child – but not his.

Jude

In late 19th-century England, Jude aspires to be an academic, but is hobbled by his blue-collar background. Instead, he works as a stonemason and is trapped in an unloving marriage to a farmer's daughter named Arabella. But when his wife leaves him, Jude sees an opportunity to improve himself. He moves to the city and begins an affair with his married cousin, Sue, courting tragedy every step of the way.