Female
'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.
Shinya Tsukamoto
Suzuki Matsuo
Ryuichi Hiroki
Miwa Nishikawa
Tetsuo Shinohara
Casts & Crew
Nene Otsuka
Naoyuki Morita
Chihiro Otsuka
Mitsuko Ishii
Hairi Katagiri
Kôen Kondô
Kyoko Hasegawa
Also Directed by Shinya Tsukamoto
Three people in Tokyo take a surreal voyage of self-discovery through memory and nightmares. "O" intends suicide while talking on a cell-phone with a stranger he meets on line who plans a simultaneous suicide. Events take a horrifying turn. Keiko Kirishima is a cool, seemingly emotionless police detective, brilliant but off-putting. She's faced with two mutilated corpses who appear to have killed themselves, but she's not sure. A cell-phone number links the deaths. She calls on Akumu Tantei, a poor and suicidal young man who has the ability to enter people's dreams. He's reluctant to help. His past haunts him. A subconscious duel of terror and blood awaits the three.
Shinya Tsukamoto's animated promo for the Ca' Foscari Cinema in Venice.
"The Law of Causality" documents a live perfomance at Shibuya O-NEST, which took place on May 26, 2004. Director of "Tetsuo The Iron Man" Shinya Tsukamoto's crew filmed the gig, which features all new material based around metal percussion and custom intsruments built by Chu Ishikawa.
Set during the Edo period, "Zan" follows the life a ronin, Mokunoshin Tsuzuki (Sosuke Ikematsu), and those around him. Mokunoshin Tsuzuki spends time in a village helping farmers there. To keep his sword skills sharp, he spars daily with a farmer's son Ichisuke (Ryusei Maeda). His sister Yu (Yu Aoi) watches them. Meanwhile, the nation is about to undergo major unrest and potentially a civil war. A group of outlaw ronin led by Sezaemon Genda (Tatsuya Nakamura) enters the village.
A successful doctor, Yukio's picture perfect life is gradually wrecked, and taken over by his avenging twin brother, who bumps off his family members one by one and reclaims his lover who is now Yukio's wife.
Set in an anonymous Japanese metropolis, the film tells the tale of shy career woman, Rinko, and Shigehiko, her hygiene-obsessed, workaholic husband. The couple explore their sexuality in a number of ways, causing their lives to be disrupted.
A businessman, Tsuda, runs into a childhood friend, Tajuki, on the subway. Tajuki is working as a semiprofessional boxer. Tsuda soon begins to suspect that Tajuki might be having an affair with his fiancée Hizuru. After an altercation, Tsuda begins training rigorously himself, leading to an extremely bloody, violent confrontation.
Made for the Venice Film Festival's 70th anniversary, seventy filmmakers made a short film between 60 and 90 seconds long on their interpretation of the future of cinema.
A "metal fetishist", driven mad by the maggots wriggling in the wound he's made to embed metal into his flesh, runs out into the night and is accidentally run down by a Japanese businessman and his girlfriend. The pair dispose of the corpse in hopes of quietly moving on with their lives. However, the businessman soon finds that he is now plagued by a vicious curse that transforms his flesh into iron.
An American named Anthony is living and working in Tokyo and married to a Japanese woman. When their son is killed by the same driver who creates the Tetsuos in previous films, he makes the transformation into Tetsuo.
Also Directed by Suzuki Matsuo
Screenwriter Goro Kaiba (Suzuki Matsuo) is horrified to learn via Facebook that his wife Ayako (Miho Nakayama) is having an affair. Furthermore, her post about the affair has received 108 likes. Absolutely furious, Goro Kaiba contemplates divorcing his wife, but he estimates he will have to pay her half of his assets, about 10,000,000 million yen, in a divorce. To get revenge, Goro Kaiba decides to use that money on a epic one month womanizing streak. His goal is 108, the number of likes his wife received on social media.
Based on renowned Japanese writer Natsume Soseki's same-titled short story collection, Ten Nights of Dreams brings ten fantastical dream sequences to film with great visual and psychological panache. Representing the combined efforts of eleven directors, this outstanding anthology delves into the surreal subconscious with ten madly imaginative, reality-subverting visions that range from wonderfully wacky to nightmarishly unsettling.
Live-action adaptation of a madcap manga about art, opposites, love and a whole lot of cosplay.
28 year old freelance writer Sakura Asuka (Yuki Uchida) wakes up tied in a white room. The white room is a protected room located in an isolated ward of a psychiatric hospital. Sakura first became unconscious because of heavy alcohol use and a druge overdose. She’s confined in the single room because of her high risk of committing suicide. Sakura tried to talk to the nurses and doctors but they didn’t listen to her. Under the circumstances another patient Miki (Yu Aoi), who suffers from an eating disorder, leads her to understand the unknown world. But, Sakura is looking for the way to get back to the real world as soon as possible.
Takeharu Takami (Ryuhei Matsuda) is a bank teller, but he becomes allergic to money. He decides not to use money at all. Takeharu decides to move to a small village in the Tohoku region. There, he encounters residents who are not so easy.
There is “another Japan,” which is divided into three countries and has been in ethnic conflict for 100 years. In the middle of the conflict, a young girl (Ikuta Erika) was kidnapped and confined by a group calling itself “National Liberation Army.” However, the girl has escaped from them to the outside world for the first time in 10 years. She befriends a girl whose father runs a business recycling artificial soldiers made from soybeans. They meet the group of boys including Harikona (Ryunosuke Kamiki) who has the ability to make flowers bloom. Keeping watch over Kegare is her adult self, Misa. This empathetic play transcends time and space. As past, present, and future get jumbled up, Kegare finally confronts an unpleasant memory that she should have forgotten. (Source: @floren646730)
Also Directed by Ryuichi Hiroki
Tsugumi Dozono (Nana Eikura) works at a large electronics company in Tokyo. She likes to spend long vacations at her grandmother’s house in the countryside. One day, her grandmother passes away and Tsugumi Dozono decides to live in her grandmother's house while working from home. She finds a strange middle-aged man in the house. The man's name is Jun Kaieda (Etsushi Toyokawa). Jun Kaieda tells Tsugumi that he is her grandmother’s ex-student and her grandmother gave him a key to the annex house. Tsugumi, who does not know the exact relationship between her grandmother and Jun, begins to live with him.
Shuichi (Tadayoshi Okura) had a motorcycle accident 4 years ago. Because of the accident, he lost the last year of his memory. One day, at a friend's wedding, Shuichi has a fateful meeting with Yoshimi (Mirei Kiritani). They enjoy happy times together and Shuichi thinks about marrying Yoshimi. Then Yoshimi becomes sick. A sad truth is hidden in the lost memory of Shuichi.
Midori is a coming-of-age drama set amongst the heady high school world of peer rivalry and sexual awakening, featuring an emotionally-detached high-school girl who, her parents dead, lives with her brother and his overprotective wife. After being sent out of class due to a dizzy spell, she becomes acquainted with Shun, a boy in the class below, in the school sanatorium. As the two begin feigning illness together on a regular basis, their uncomfortable flirtations soon blossom into a full sexual relationship.
"Daijobu 3 Kumi" depicts the interactions between new teacher Shinnosuke Akao, who was born without arms and legs, and the 28 students in his 5th grade class, told from the vantage point of school board member Yusaku Shiraishi
Based on an award winning novel, It's Only Talk is about the life of Yuko, a 35 year old woman. She is single and unemployed, and suffers from manic depression. The movie begins with Yuko moving to Kamata Town.
Seijiro Ito possesses good looks, but also has an overinflated ego. He gets involved with five different women. Rio Yazaki is one of the women involved with Seijiro Ito. She wants to revive her career as a screenwriter, by using other people's unhappiness.
Natsumi wants to become a photographer. She takes a bike which her late father left behind and goes to a forest to find a firefly she saw with her father. In the forest, Natsumi meets old mother Yasu and old son Jizo. They run a general store. Natsumi learns how to live in nature from them. She has happy summer days there. One day, Jizo tells her that he became estranged from his son in the past.
Rei is a freelance writer embattled by personal demons. She hears voices in her head, and has sleeping problems, eating disorders and drinks excessively. On Valentine's Day, she meets truck driver Takatoshi. She joins him on a journey in his bumpy and shaky truck - which vibrates in tune with her uneasy soul.
Also Directed by Miwa Nishikawa
Based on renowned Japanese writer Natsume Soseki's same-titled short story collection, Ten Nights of Dreams brings ten fantastical dream sequences to film with great visual and psychological panache. Representing the combined efforts of eleven directors, this outstanding anthology delves into the surreal subconscious with ten madly imaginative, reality-subverting visions that range from wonderfully wacky to nightmarishly unsettling.
A recently widowed writer whose wife died in a bus crash comes to terms with his grief—or lack of it—in caring for the children of a working man who also lost his wife in the same accident.
A portrait of an ordinary family that turns unstable when their frivolous son Shuji returns home after a long absence.
Charming little story about a local town's doctor - but he is hiding a secret. He will have to come face to face with this truth, despite being great at his job... he will be forced to explain his actions and take responsibility.
After losing their restaurant in a fire, a husband and wife come up with a strange plan to rebuild their shattered finances: marrying the husband off to a series of lonely women and defrauding them.
Mikami, an ex-yakuza of middle age with most of his life in prison, gets released after serving 13 years of sentence for murder. Hoping to find his long lost mother, from whom he was separated as a child, he applies for a TV show and meets a young TV director Tsunoda. Meanwhile, he struggles to get a proper job and fit into society. His impulsive, adamant nature and ingrained beliefs cause friction in his relationship with Tsunoda and those who want to help him.
A murder investigation reveals a deep-rooted sibling rivalry in director Miwa Nishikawa's brooding family drama. On the one-year anniversary of his mother's death, Tokyo art and fashion photographer Takeru (Joe Odagiri) returns to his small hometown in order to pay his respects. But all is not well back home, and when Takeru's authoritative father questions his sincerity, the frustrated son strikes back with accusations of violent conduct. Though the situation is initially diffused by Takeru's older brother Moniru (Teruyuki Kagawa), who stayed behind to run the family business, tensions once again start to run high when Tekeru, Moniru, and pretty childhood friend Cheiko (Yoko Maki) decide to celebrate their reunion by taking a hike in the wilderness.
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.
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.
Original Video film directed by Tetsuo Shinohara
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.