Haruko Sugimura
Also Known As: Харуко Сугимура, هاروکو سوگیمورا
Biography: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Haruko Sugimura (杉村 春子 Sugimura Haruko, January 6, 1909 – April 4, 1997) was a Japanese stage and film actress, best known for her appearances in the movies of Yasujiro Ozu and Mikio Naruse from the late 1940s to the early 1960s. In the West, her most famous role was that of Shige, the elderly couple's hairdresser daughter in Ozu's Tokyo Story (1953). Description above from the Wikipedia article Haruko Sugimura, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Department: Acting
Place of Birth: Hiroshima, Japan
Birthday: January 07, 1909
Deathday: April 04, 1997
Adult: No
Gender: Female
Popularity:
Known For:
The Scent of Incense
Overview: After her mother runs away from home, Tomoko is raised to be a geisha. One day Tomoko meets her mother in a red-light district in Tokyo and her life deeply gets in trouble.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1964-05-24
Popularity:
Kin no tamago: Golden Girl
Overview: Once an average and seemingly ordinary Tokyo girl, she suddenly finds herself as a TV star owing to her discovery by a casting company, which noticed photographs that her cousin had sent. When another actress falls ill she is given the role instead. Her first film is a success propelling the young actress to popularity, her own fans, money and a house. While everything looks dandy from the outside not all is well within the family however.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1952-05-14
Popularity:
The Day England Falls
Overview:
Genres: War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1942-11-19
Popularity:
Red Beard
Overview: Aspiring to an easy job as personal physician to a wealthy family, Noboru Yasumoto is disappointed when his first post after medical school takes him to a small country clinic under the gruff doctor Red Beard. Yasumoto rebels in numerous ways, but Red Beard proves a wise and patient teacher. He gradually introduces his student to the unglamorous side of the profession, ultimately assigning him to care for a prostitute rescued from a local brothel.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1965-04-03
Popularity:
Jidanya
Overview: Every day a car accident happens in the city. The involved parties are prey to the settlement agents (jidanya), mediators between the parts and the insurance companies to avoid time-consuming legal actions that could come when no settlement is reached (while cheating both parties out of some piece of the settlement pay). Genkichi is a well versed old-timer, that sees how his freshly out of collage son struggles to fit into the business, while at the same time facing one of his lowest rivals in a car crash incident.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1963-10-30
Popularity:
Late Spring
Overview: Noriko is perfectly happy living at home with her widowed father, Shukichi, and has no plans to marry -- that is, until her aunt Masa convinces Shukichi that unless he marries off his 27-year-old daughter soon, she will likely remain alone for the rest of her life. When Noriko resists Masa's matchmaking, Shukichi is forced to deceive his daughter and sacrifice his own happiness to do what he believes is right.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1949-09-13
Popularity:
Early Spring
Overview: A young Tokyo salary man and his wife struggle within the confines of their passionless relationship while he has an extramarital affair.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1956-01-29
Popularity:
Kwaidan
Overview: Taking its title from an archaic Japanese word meaning "ghost story," this anthology adapts four folk tales. A penniless samurai marries for money with tragic results. A man stranded in a blizzard is saved by Yuki the Snow Maiden, but his rescue comes at a cost. Blind musician Hoichi is forced to perform for an audience of ghosts. An author relates the story of a samurai who sees another warrior's reflection in his teacup.
Genres: Horror Fantasy Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1965-01-06
Popularity:
G-Men of Japan
Overview: The investigative unit of the Metropolitan Police Department organized a special investigative team to uncover a series of frequent gang robberies and car gangs... This is the first film in the Nippon G-Men series, of which four more films were later released.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1948-10-12
Popularity:
Youth After School
Overview: "Youth After School" takes Tokyo and Kyoto as the stage, and tells the story of a family that develops around the daughter's marriage. The play was broadcast on NHK TV in 1963, but the program recording technology was not mature at that time, and relevant people called it "phantom TV drama (幻のドラマ)". However, this TV series that was originally thought to be lost has been rediscovered after 50 years.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1963-03-21
Popularity:
The End of Summer
Overview: The family of an older man who runs a small sake brewery become concerned with his finances and his health after they discover him visiting an old mistress from his youth.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1961-10-29
Popularity:
Good Morning
Overview: 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.
Genres: Comedy Family Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1959-05-12
Popularity:
Till Tomorow Comes
Overview: 1962 Japanese movie
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-02-10
Popularity:
Late Chrysanthemums
Overview: With delicate, unobtrusive strokes, Naruse evokes both the humor and bitterness of his characters’ dilemmas, in this bleak, compelling poignant portrait of a quartet of aging geishas contemplating their troubles with men and money.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1954-06-15
Popularity:
No Regrets for Our Youth
Overview: Over more than a decade, the daughter of a Kyoto Imperial University professor comes of age as she witnesses her father fired for opposing the rise of fascism in Japan and becomes involved with two of his students.
Genres: Drama War History
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1946-10-29
Popularity:
Four Seasons of Women
Overview: Woman melodrama by Shiro Toyoda
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1950-02-27
Popularity:
Musume to watashi
Overview:
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-04-01
Popularity:
Repast
Overview: Michiyo lives in the small place Osaka and is not happy with her marriage; all she does is cook and clean for her husband.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-11-23
Popularity:
Flowing
Overview: Otsuta is running the geisha house Tsuta in Tokyo. Her business is heavily in debt. Her daughter Katsuyo doesn't see any future in her mother's trade in the late days of Geisha. But Otsuta will not give up. This film portraits the day time life of geisha when not entertaining customers.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1956-11-20
Popularity:
Their Legacy
Overview: 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.
Genres: Drama Comedy
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-01-03
Popularity:
Floating Weeds
Overview: When a theater troupe's master visits his old flame, he unintentionally sets off a chain of unexpected events with devastating consequences. A remake of Ozu's own silent film The Story of Floating Weeds (1934).
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1959-11-17
Popularity:
The Wife of Seishu Hanaoka
Overview: The disturbing story of a physician who conducted the first operation with general anaesthetic, and the women in his life who are both so determined to win his love that they volunteer as subjects for his experiments
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1967-10-28
Popularity:
Rokujō yukiyama tsumugi
Overview: Young widow Ine is suffering under the harsh treatment of her mother in law. As a former Geisha, Ine had struggled to be accepted into the well-established Rokujo family from the beginning. With the support of Jiro, a young man Ine's late husband had saved from homelessness as a young boy, Ine tries to keep the family's heritage of silk processing alive. Their close relationship soon causes gossip among the villagers and threaten Ine's position in the family even further ...
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1965-10-09
Popularity:
Tokyo Story
Overview: The elderly Shukishi and his wife, Tomi, take the long journey from their small seaside village to visit their adult children in Tokyo. Their elder son, Koichi, a doctor, and their daughter, Shige, a hairdresser, don't have much time to spend with their aged parents, and so it falls to Noriko, the widow of their younger son who was killed in the war, to keep her in-laws company.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1953-11-03
Popularity:
Early Summer
Overview: A 28-year-old single woman is pressured to marry.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-10-03
Popularity:
Tokyo Twilight
Overview: Two sisters find out the existence of their long-lost mother, but the younger cannot accept the fact that she was abandoned as a child.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1957-04-30
Popularity:
Princess Yang Kwei Fei
Overview: In eighth century China, the Emperor is grieving over the death of his wife. The Yang family wants to provide the Emperor with a consort so that they may consolidate their influence over the court. General An Lushan finds a distant relative working in their kitchen whom they groom to present to the Emperor. The Emperor falls in love with her 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. The ministers misuse their power so much that there is a popular revolt against the Yangs, fueled by An Lushan.
Genres: Romance Drama History
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1955-05-03
Popularity:
Jun'ai monogatari kusa no mi
Overview: 1962 Japanese movie
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-05-09
Popularity:
Night Scandal
Overview:
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1964-07-11
Popularity:
Samurai Assassin
Overview: Japan, 1860. The men of the Mito clan, victims of the Ansei purge, anxiously prowl around the Sakurada Gate of Edo Castle with the intention of assassinating Naosuke Ii of Hikone, tairō of the Tokugawa shogunate and responsible for their misfortune.
Genres: Drama Action History
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1965-01-03
Popularity:
A Last Note
Overview: A retired actress whose husband has recently died visits her summer home. There she has encounters with old friends and acquaintances who bring various stories and news of death and the past
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1995-06-03
Popularity:
The Broken Commandment
Overview: Ushimatsu's father told him never to reveal his lower-caste heritage; years later, he now contemplates confiding in an activist fighting against such discrimination.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-04-06
Popularity:
She Was Like a Wild Chrysanthemum
Overview: On the way back to his childhood home, a septuagenarian man recalls his childhood and adolescence, in particular his love for a young woman.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1955-11-29
Popularity:
Morning for the Osone Family
Overview: A Japanese family weathers much hardship after their military uncle comes to live with them during WWII.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1946-02-21
Popularity:
Summer Clouds
Overview: A war widow with a young boy manages a farm with her bossy mother-in-law. When a reporter comes to interview her, the two begin an affair. He turns out to be married and won't leave his wife. Her older brother tries to marry off his children and hang on to/ extend his farm through an advantageous marriage in the face of threatened land confiscation and the desire of his children to get comfortable urban jobs instead of the backbreaking work in the paddy fields under parental control.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1958-09-02
Popularity:
Only Child
Overview:
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1969-05-06
Popularity:
The Petrified Forest
Overview: Follows a young med student's relationships with two women: a dangerous affair with a childhood friend and his mother's struggle to rebuild their estranged relationship.
Genres: Crime Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1973-09-01
Popularity:
Yotsuya Ghost Story Part 1
Overview: Iemon Tamiya is an impoverished masterless samurai who craves a better life, which he cannot have because of his marriage to Oiwa, who is completely devoted to her husband.
Genres: Horror
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1949-07-05
Popularity:
Yotsuya Ghost Story Part 2
Overview: Part 2 starts where the first film ended, with Iemon disposing of the bodies of his wife and Kohei, marrying upward, and being blackmailed by the evil Naosuke.
Genres: Horror
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1949-07-16
Popularity:
White Heron
Overview: OSHINO, the beautiful daughter of restaurant owners, is in love with SHIRASAGI the painter. But there is another young man, the son of a moneylender family, who is desperately in love with Oshino...
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1941-09-09
Popularity:
A Diary of Our Love
Overview: Drama about a young nurse who falls in love with a disabled soldier, and based a true story.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1941-11-07
Popularity:
Spring Awakens
Overview: Slice of life film centered on a couple of years in the life of a rural high school girl.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1947-11-02
Popularity:
The Story of Shunkin
Overview: Based on the novel by Junichiro Tanizaki. Story of the beautiful blind daughter of a wealthy businessman who falls in love with a servant.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1954-06-27
Popularity:
The Romance of Yushima
Overview: Hayase, a schoolteacher, assists Sakai in editing a German-Japanese dictionary. Hayase owes much to Sakai, as Sakai raised him for 13 years after Hayase lost his parents in a war. Hayase has been secretly married to Otsuta, a former geisha, and has been unable to tell Sakai of the marriage, aware as he is that Sakai wants him to marry his daughter, Taeko. Otsuta wants Hayase to tell Sakai about her, but understands the difficulty of his position. At a festival, Otsuta is mistaken for a pickpocket and taken to the police. Because of her background as a geisha, newspaper reporters eagerly delve into her past and report that she has been married to Hayase. Unaware of what has been printed in the papers, Hayase decides to tell Sakai about his marriage. Sakai shows the newspaper to him and orders Hayase to part with Otsuta. Given no chance to explain, Hayase accepts Sakai's order.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1955-09-28
Popularity:
Umi no tora
Overview: 1945 Japanese movie
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1945-02-08
Popularity:
The Conspirator
Overview: Young lord Saburo Nobuyasu struggles to find comfort in life. His arranged marriage to Tokuhime, daughter of one-time family enemy Oda Nobunaga, provides little happiness. His manipulative mother adds further complications through her constant interference and attempts at defeating the Nobunaga family.
Genres: Drama History
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1961-11-08
Popularity:
Kanchō umi no bara
Overview: 1945 Japanese movie
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1945-02-22
Popularity:
The Lights of Asakusa
Overview: Pre-war Asakusa was a riotous district of cabarets, dance-halls and brothels - a striking backdrop for Shimazu's story of innocence and experience. Pretty, young Reiko is the new dancer in an infamous theatre troupe, and her fellow performers try to protect her virtue in a land of vice. Meanwhile, an ageing actor wants to be a hero off stage as well as on, and the troupe matriarch Marie has to keep them all together.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1937-12-02
Popularity:
愛情の旋風
Overview:
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-02-10
Popularity:
Dorei kōjō
Overview: After the death of a colleague, the workers at a factory form a labor union.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1968-01-25
Popularity:
Army
Overview: Though plagued by ill health all his life, a young Japanese man is obligated to fulfill his family's longstanding military tradition.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1944-12-07
Popularity:
The Gambler's Code
Overview: One of Japan's most popular stories is the tale of Kutsukake Tokijiro, a traveling gambler who finds that he must take care of the wife and child of a yakuza he had been forced by the code of the gamblers to fight man to man. In a brilliant performance from super-star Ichikawa Raizo, with strong support from two of the greats from Toho, Shimura Takashi (7 Samurai) and Aratama Michiyo (Sword of Doom) the heartfelt story reaches new heights. Tokijiro, having learned the true nature of the boss to whom he was obligated for having spent a night and eaten at the gang's headquarters takes up arms against them in a running battle fought across the back roads of the entire nation. Another powerful rendition of this superb story, it is not to be missed!
Genres: History Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1961-06-14
Popularity:
Freedom School
Overview: Minamimura, who had always wanted to be free, suddenly quits his job. His hardworking wife is surprised and angry, and throws him out of the house. Confused by his sudden freedom, Iosuke ends up living as a vagrant under a bridge. His wife, Komako, also finds herself freed and is unable to ignore her confusion.
Genres: Drama Comedy
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-05-05
Popularity:
Hadaka no Machi
Overview:
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1957-07-23
Popularity:
A Descendant of Urashima Taro
Overview: Reputedly based on Frank Capra’s 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, A Descendant of Tarô Urashima is about a repatriated soldier who becomes populist politician in the Japanese Happiness Party.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1946-03-28
Popularity:
Temptation
Overview: A young lawyer falls in love with the daughter of his former professor, whom he's hired to tutor his children.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1948-04-01
Popularity:
Samurai of the Great Earth
Overview: A film adaptation of Rikuo Honjo's novel "Ishikari River".
Genres: Action
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1956-01-29
Popularity:
The Written Face
Overview: In Japanese theater, women's roles are traditionally played by men. The man playing the woman's role, the Onnagata, does not imitate the woman, as in the West, but tries to capture her significance. He need not stick close to his model, but draws far more from his own identity - a shift of value takes place, which is nonetheless not a step beyond. THE WRITTEN FACE is an attempt to offer an insight into the Japanese Kabuki star Tamasaburo Bando, one of the last defenders of this ancient and disappearing performing tradition.
Genres: Documentary TV Movie Fantasy
Original Language: de
Release Date: 1995-09-01
Popularity:
The Crowded Train
Overview: Tamio Moroi, a young university graduate, works at a large brewery where he is taught to do nothing but look busy. When his father goes insane, he is told to send money for medical research into the condition. This prompts him to pay his father a visit, leading to a series of mishaps that leaves him at the bottom of the heap in what he once expected to be a promising lifetime career.
Genres: Comedy Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1957-03-29
Popularity:
Daughters, Wives and a Mother
Overview: Sanae is left a widow after her prestigious husband dies, but holds the proceeds of a million yen insurance policy. Being childless, her former in-laws have no objection to her return to her own family.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1960-05-21
Popularity:
Umi o yobu koe
Overview: 1945 Japanese movie
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1945-10-25
Popularity:
The Rokumeikan
Overview: TV drama based off the play of the same name by Yukio Mishima.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1959-07-09
Popularity:
The Rokumeikan
Overview: TV drama based off the play of the same name by Yukio Mishima.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1961-12-01
Popularity:
Buddha
Overview: An Indian prince leaves his world of comfort and riches behind to wander and meditate for six years in search of spiritual enlightenment. Siddartha (Cojoin Hong) turns his back on the old religion when people are starving needlessly and holy rituals include human sacrifices. During his meditations, he is tempted by erotic dancing women, demons, and the evil machinations of his criminal cousin. Devastate to attain the spiritual perfection and become the Buddha. He travels to convert followers by his kindness and wisdom, gaining a multitude of believers when he stops an elephant from crushing a local priest. Buddha of course goes on to become one of the great religious leaders of the world.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1961-10-31
Popularity:
Akumyo: Notorious Dragon
Overview: About small-time gangster Asakichi's chaotic life in the 1930s. His gambling addiction means that he must not continue working in the family business. Instead he supports himself by arranging cockfights. He becomes ex-geisha Okinu's patron and lover, and falls directly into disfavor with the yakuza.
Genres: No genres available
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1974-04-24
Popularity:
Fireworks Over the Sea
Overview: A fishing union depends on two brothers to make up the losses caused by the dishonest captains they replaced.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-10-25
Popularity:
Policeman's Diary
Overview: Lending money, job hunting for civilians and babysitting. All these things are usually not listed on a policeman's job description. But for the officers of this local police station, it‘s part of their daily routine. One day, patrolman Yoshii (Hisaya Morishige) finds an abandoned baby and a six year old girl standing in front of the station. When he's declined by the welfare office, orphanage and local health clinic to take them in, he decides to take care of them himself.
Genres: Drama Comedy
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1955-02-03
Popularity:
Listen to the Voices of the Sea
Overview: This film is strongly anti-war film. The film is based on the collection of writings by Japanese student soldiers who died during World War II. The film is located to Burma. It shows the everyday problems of soldiers in contrast of their ideas and the cynicism of their commanders. Soldiers are also victims of military bullying by their commanders.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1950-06-15
Popularity:
Till We Meet Again
Overview: Saburo and Keiko fall in love with each other but the tide of war separates them.
Genres: Romance War Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1950-03-21
Popularity:
The Rainbow-Colored Flower
Overview: Ebihara is a budding novelist entangled in a complicated web of relationships with three women from three different generations: Kazue, a coquettish teenage war orphan who tries to offer herself for money but is instead taken in by Ebihara, Koyabu, a middle-aged woman who has spent much of her life as the kept woman of a wealthy man, and Teruko, the modest daughter of Ebihara's former teacher who comes to rely on him after the death of her father.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1950-10-14
Popularity:
The Strange Tale of Oyuki
Overview: A story of Japanese writer Kafu Nagai (1879-1959), a man about sixty with a huge reputation of seducer who falls madly in love for a young geisha named Oyuki. Meticulous and smartly dressed, Nagai patiently wrote in his diary his thoughts during many years. A melancholy reflection on the passage of time and a brilliant interpretive exercise.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1992-06-06
Popularity:
Life of Geisha
Overview: The tragedy of the geiko girl Ume and the men who try to pursue her.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1955-01-22
Popularity:
Deep River Melody
Overview: A poignant story about a young couple, Setsu and Chozo, who are torn apart to save Setsu's father's restaurant.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1960-09-13
Popularity:
The Spell of the Hidden Gold
Overview: Historical drama about a sleepy-eyed ronin.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1958-10-21
Popularity:
The Wiser Age
Overview: Drama about the lives of the five daughters and daughter-in-law of a store owner.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-01-14
Popularity:
The Woman Who Touched Legs
Overview: Detective Katahachi meets a young and beautiful pickpocket and doesn’t arrest her because she was not in the act. Instead, he listens to the story about her parents who killed himself and died for overwork to feel sorry about her.
Genres: Comedy Crime
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1960-08-24
Popularity:
Spring on Leper's Island
Overview: A female doctor's story of her life in an isolated leper colony.
Genres: History Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1940-07-31
Popularity:
Great X
Overview: A 1948 Japanese film.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1948-05-07
Popularity:
Goodbye to Glory
Overview: A story of an ardent young man who laid down his life for his country.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1960-04-01
Popularity:
I Lived, But...
Overview: An extremely lovely tribute to Ozu, on the 20th anniversary of his death. It uses a combination of footage from vintage films and new material (both interviews and Ozu-related locations) shot by Ozu's long-time camera-man (who came out of retirement to work on this). Surprisingly (or perhaps not), it focuses less on Ozu's accomplishments as a film-maker than on his impact on the lives of the people he worked with..
Genres: Documentary
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1983-10-29
Popularity:
Mother
Overview: A divorced woman enters a marriage arranged by her mother in exchange for money to save the life of her seriously ill son.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1963-11-08
Popularity:
Runway to Hell
Overview: When Kaneko Ichinosuke aims to avenge his father who was wrongly accused of embezzlement, the samurai Kochiyama Soshun agrees to assist.
Genres: Action Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1960-05-03
Popularity:
Reminiscence
Overview: Kazuo Miyagawa’s prizewinning black-and-white cinematography draws out the moral shadings of Nobel laureate Yasunari Kawabata’s 1952 novel Thousand Cranes, a quietly devastating story of a young man, orphaned during the war, who stumbles into a passionate yet tragic relationship with his late father’s mistress and her daughter.
Genres: Drama War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1953-01-15
Popularity:
Children Hand in Hand
Overview: A small-town boy with a learning disability attempts to fit in with his classmates.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1948-03-30
Popularity:
The Three Treasures
Overview: The legend of the birth of Shintoism. In Fourth Century Japan, the Emperor's son Ouso expects to succeed his father on the throne, but Otomo, the Emperor's vassal, prefers Ouso's stepbrother, and conspires to have Ouso die on a dangerous mission he has contrived. But Ouso prevails in the mission and returns to his father's castle under a new name, Prince Yamato Takeru. Otomo plots to have the Prince sent into even greater danger, but Otomo is unaware that the gods have favored the Prince and the outcome is far from what any of them expected.
Genres: Fantasy Action Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1959-11-01
Popularity:
The Fossil
Overview: An industrialist is diagnosed with terminal cancer. He is on a trip to Europe at the time, and a glimpse of a Japanese woman in that setting causes him to fantasize about her as the personification of his impending death. As his dialogue with his imagined mortality continues, he actually meets the living woman who is the template for his fantasy, and together they tour rural churches. Gradually he comes to some kind of peace about the diagnosis. When he returns to Japan, he is met with a series of challenges which profoundly test the lessons he has learned.
Genres: Drama Fantasy
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1974-01-01
Popularity:
Beauty the Enemy
Overview: In a rural district of Tokyo, the owner of a farm is abandoned by his two daughters who are attracted to the life of the big city.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1959-08-12
Popularity:
The Daphne
Overview: Four sisters are all named after flowers. While the two youngest are married, the eldest two remain single, much to the annoyance of their long-suffering mother. The mother and her brother try various schemes to find husbands for them.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1966-10-01
Popularity:
An Autumn Afternoon
Overview: Shuhei Hirayama is a widower with a 24-year-old daughter. Gradually, he comes to realize that she should not be obliged to look after him for the rest of his life, so he arranges a marriage for her.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1962-11-18
Popularity:
Wedding Day
Overview: Twenty-year-old Yoshiko (Setsuko Hara) and her younger sister Asako (Yōko Yaguchi) struggle to accept changes in their home during the preparations of their widowed father's wedding to his chosen bride, Maki Tsuneko (Sadako Sawamura), who's anxious about her conduct as the bride.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1940-03-20
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The Navy
Overview: A tale of two best friends in the WWII era Japan. Takao is a young man enthusiastic about joining the navy to fight for his country. He convinces his best friend Shinji to join him. As it turns out, however, Takao's poor health prevents him from entering the navy while his friend is chosen instead. As time goes by, Takao becomes a painter and changes his mind about the meaningfulness of war and fighting, while his friend goes the opposite path. Meanwhile Takao's sister falls in love with Shinji.
Genres: War Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1963-08-13
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Sakura-tai Chiru
Overview: A documentary about the lives of actors in the Sakura-tai theatrical troupe, which had arrived in the island of Hiroshima to begin preparations for the staging of a play just before the atomic bombing.
Genres: Documentary Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1988-04-01
Popularity:
Forbidden Path
Overview:
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1952-07-08
Popularity:
Sunflower Girl
Overview: Young Setsuko Fujino begins a new job at Tokyo Chemical Company. She likes her boss, Ippei Hitachi, and enjoys serving him tea, despite the fact that her fellow workers think the women employees should not have to act in such a servile manner. When the women go on strike over the issue, Setsuko finds herself caught in the middle. When the heir to the company, Ryosuke Tanabe, proposes marriage to Setsuko, she is honored, but realizes that her real affection is for Hitachi.
Genres: Comedy
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1953-03-26
Popularity:
Namiko
Overview: An early Japanese sound film, notable for being the only Japanese film ever to use the Western Electric Sound System. Contrary to most Western sources that give sole directing credit to Eizo Tanaka, it was actually co-directed by six different directors, Tanaka, Kazue Kimura, Kazuo Takimura, Ryoji Mikami and Hidekuni Ouchi.
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1932-05-19
Popularity:
Three-Fingered Detective
Overview: Being acquainted with the bride's uncle, a famed private detective is invited to a wedding ceremony. The groom's family is moneyed and owns large tracts of land. The bride is a former teacher and was rumoured to have had an affair, which explains why the groom's family opposed the union. On the night of the ceremony the bride and groom are killed in a sealed room. There is evidence left, however, as there is a hand print on the wall albeit with only the trace of three fingers.
Genres: Horror
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1947-12-09
Popularity:
With Beauty and Sorrow
Overview: When the man who seduced the famous painter Otoko as a teenager--and then wrote a bestselling novel about it--reappears in her life, her pupil--and lesbian lover--hatches a plot to destroy the man and his family.
Genres: Romance Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1965-02-28
Popularity:
Onna no hanamichi
Overview: A film commemorating the 25th anniversary of Hibari Misora's performing career. Written by Matsutaro Kawaguchi for Hibari Misora to celebrate her 25th anniversary. The film tells the story of a fisherman's daughter from Izumo who rises from poverty to Kyoto, throws herself into the harsh world of dance, abandons her promised future and love, and finds the path to womanhood by living a life devoted to her art, which is rooted in the masses. Hibari Misora plays the role of a 16-year-old girl to a mature 26-year-old woman in this film, which also contains many autobiographical elements of the singer, who made her debut at the age of 8 and has continued to sing about the joys and sorrows of the common people, thereby touching the hearts of the Japanese people.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1971-11-20
Popularity:
An Inlet of Muddy Water
Overview: A Japanese woman writes down three stories she has witnessed or heard of in her diary, each about the difficult situation a young woman finds herself in.
Genres: History Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1953-11-23
Popularity:
Nightingale
Overview: An episodic film about life in and around a rural police station and the people it serves.
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1938-11-09
Popularity:
The Glorious Days
Overview: The Glorious Days
Genres: War
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1954-04-14
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The Wind Blows Twice
Overview: Kanae, who broke up with her husband and moved to her uncle's house, met two men when her father, a university professor, collapsed. Michihara, a wealthy man and Miyashita, a youth scholar. Kanae is attracted to Miyashita, but ...
Genres: Drama Romance
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1952-02-14
Popularity:
Beauty of Life
Overview: Inochi uruwashi
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1951-12-07
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Tale of Jiro
Overview:
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1941-12-11
Popularity:
Ōhinata-mura
Overview: The year is 1936. Ōhinata-mura was a very poor village between deep valleys. Soncho, the village head is trying to collect the village taxes from the villagers but he knows full well that no one can afford to pay the village tax which has been unpaid for years...
Genres: Drama
Original Language: ja
Release Date: 1940-10-30
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