Casts & Crew
Also Directed by Tetsuo Shinohara
Based on a short story written by Shuhei Fujisawa (who also wrote Twilight Samurai, The Hidden Blade, Love and Honor), the film depicts the uneasy life of Noe Isomura (Rena Tanaka) with the difficult family she has married into after her former husband passed away. One day as she tries to brake off a branch of a cherry tree, she is aided by a samurai who she does not recognize but who recognizes her. He turns out to be a former suitor that she never met named Yaichiro Tezuka (Noriyuki Higashiyama) and who teaches swordsmanship to the local samurai. Meanwhile, the powerful new chief retainer of the village enacts land policies that threaten the survival of the local farmers.
Natsumi is proposed to by Yamato, a man who aims to become a fisherman to succeed his father. Her grandmother Kiyo, who raised her since a young age, broke her legs and uses a wheelchair now. Kiyo lives in a facility where Natsumi visits to tell her about the wedding. Natsumi suggests the idea of Kiyo walking along the wedding aisle with her, which encourages the week Kiyo. With that mindset, Kiyo regains hope and try to get better with the help of Natsumi
The story of a Japanese sub's last mission during WWII.
Shinji (Shinichi Tsutsumi) steps out of a train station to find himself transported back to 1964.
'Female' is comprised of five short films adapted from five novels by female authors. Directed by Shinya Tsukamoto, Tetsuo Shinohara, Ryuichi Hiroki, Miwa Nishikawa, and Suzuki Matsuo.
A man on his way home from a wedding. When he wakes up drunk, he finds himself in a park in the early morning. As he wanders the city in the early morning, he meets a girl on a mountain bike and is suddenly chased by the police instead of the girl. The camera, which had been following the lazy, fresh morning air, turns around and starts running away with the man. The police chase him relentlessly. As he struggles to outrun his pursuers, he finds himself becoming increasingly elated. As he runs, he finds himself becoming more and more elated, as if it is the start of a journey away from the boredom of everyday life. The camera work is superb, eloquently capturing the man running with all his might.
A samurai Sakunosuke gets an order from clan chamberlain to kill another samurai who is married with his own younger sister. As a loyal samurai he has to accept the mission even though he has inner conflicts.
This coming-of-age story from Japan opens just after 17-year-old Sataka has gotten dumped by her boyfriend. When her mother is hospitalized with a malignant stomach ulcer, Sataka is left alone with her emotionally repressed father; whiling away the hours one day, she comes across a love letter written to her mother 24 years earlier. Deciding to track down the letter's author, Sataka eventually finds Shinichiro (Hiroyuki Sanada), an overweight slob who was abandoned by his wife years earlier and now spends his time hanging around pachinko parlors. Determined to clean him up and reintroduce him to her mother, Sataka nags Shinchiro until he finally agrees to her demands, and a gradual friendship develops between the two as Sataka drags him to the gym and a clothing store. But once Shinchiro's makeover is complete, he turns the tables on his young friend, and when the time comes for him to meet Sataka's mother, all concerned parties find themselves embarking on a new phase in their lives.
