Eri Watanabe

It was a pre-destined love and marriage for Sonoko and Tetsuo. They tied the knot and became husband and wife no questions asked. All is well then. Well, perhaps not. Each holds a secret that even the binds of matrimony cannot untie. Sonoko does not know that Tetsuo makes sex dolls or Dutch wives. Sonoko has a secret too. She is about to tell Tetsuo what she has been hiding. Their marriage is already sexless. Will they make it?

6.2/10
6%

The story centers on a group of young people who travel back in time when they are in a movie theater just before closing time. They witness deaths during the closing days of Japan’s feudal times and on the battlefront in China before they are sent to Hiroshima just before the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing of the city.

6.1/10
10%

Hiroshi Tanaka moves to Tokyo after being laid off from his job.

5.4/10

Set at a movie theater in a small village around 100 years ago. Silent films are play at the movie theater. A young man aspires to become a benshi, a performer that provides live narration to silent films.

6.9/10

Mary Smith, a young girl who lives with her great-aunt in the countryside, follows a mysterious cat into the nearby forest where she finds a strange flower and an old broom, none of which is as ordinary as it seems.

6.8/10
8.9%

A world wide electrical outage occurs. Everything that requires electricity comes to a stop. Tokyo is nearly ruined. Yoshiyuki Suzuki (Fumiyo Kohinata) decides to escape from Tokyo with his family.

7.2/10

Makoto Masaki and Haruko Kogetsu are both 29 years old and single. Since they were children, they have passed each other at various places like on the beach and shrines. Yet, the two are not aware of each other at all. One day, a man appears in front of Makoto Masaki and introduces himself as God. He tells Makoto Masaki about his destined soul mate and that she works next door. When he faces Haruko Kogetsu, he tells her "I'm your destiny."

7/10

He is rejected by his sister when the brother floats the idea that their father move from his house to her apartment. The father has other ideas however and shows up unannounced at her doorstep with his belongings. She has little space, a boyfriend she lives with it and does not need a cranky father.

6.8/10

For as long as she can remember, Haruko has wanted to be a geisha. Eager to start her career, she approaches a teahouse in one of Kyoto’s famous geisha districts to become an apprentice geisha, or maiko—only to be rejected due to her lack of references, country bumpkin dialect and uncultivated demeanor. By chance, her accent catches the interest of Professor Kyono, a linguistics specialist and regular patron at the teahouse. He strikes a deal with the teahouse proprietor, promising to transform Haruko’s strong dialect into ladylike speech within 6 months. But becoming a maiko is no easy feat: have the professor and Haruko underestimated the task ahead? Based loosely on the Audrey Hepburn classic My Fair Lady, Lady Maiko is a musical comedy that provides a window into the world of geisha and the dedication it takes to achieve your dreams.

6.4/10

Ohisama is a Japanese television drama that aired on NHK in 2011 in the Asadora time slot. Set in Nagano prefecture, "Ohisama" covers the life of Yoko Sudo (Mao Inoue) through World War II. Yoko Sudo with her smile is able to bring brightness to those around her & she follows her mother's motif to laugh through the hard times. During the onset of WW II, Yoko is a high school student and "Ohisama" follows her as she eventually becomes a teacher and then gets married and has a child. Yoko then opens a soba restaurant with her student. --asianwiki

7.3/10

Nakajima looks up to his father, who was a war photographer, but can only get a job as an assistant for gravure magazines. Mizuno is a provisional high school teacher, currently on probation. Nishimura is Mizuno's best friend, whose boyfriend has been avoiding her since she discovered she was pregnant. Ichihara works at a magazine where he is being blackmailed into sexual favours by his chief editor. Park, on Twitter, takes on the persona of a doctor, when he is actually working at a company that sells medical equipment to disinterested doctors, and at the same time, trying to take care of his younger sister. This is a story about the blossoming friendship of five young people who were brought together by Twitter, and their journey to finding honesty with each other and with themselves.

6.9/10

The story focuses on 26-year-old Rika (Ueto), a single editor who is unskilled in love. The story starts when a man (Uchino) appears before her, telling her that he is her husband from 10 years in the future. He informs her that she will meet the young version of himself in a few days, but begs her not to marry him. Tokyograph

7.2/10

"Gakeppuchi no Eri" describes the turbulent life of Eriko (Yamada), who has been extremely poor since childhood, due to the debt left by her parents. Despite constant misfortune, she aims to achieve happiness and money by moving to Tokyo to pursue life as a manga artist. --Tokyograph

The drama is based on a true story of Yamaguchi Hayato (25), a young man who learns he has a rare illness known as CIDP, which affects the nervous system. He begins to lose the functioning of his limbs, but he is determined to fight the illness with the support of his wife and his 2-year-old daughter, Myu-chan.

7.6/10

In a small town of Hokkaido, Yunni, Fusako Kurokawa (Saki Takaoka), lives a quiet life with her father. Life here is very simple, but it is good enough and she is happy enough. Days go on as usual. with some coincidence, she meets this man one day, Wataru Kadokura (Atsuro Watabe) a man who cannot speak. A very peaceful "time" now becomes part of her daily life as this strong emotion suddenly takes place in her simple quiet life.

6.8/10

A diver on the university team must decide which of her two childhood friends she loves, and they're both on the swim team. High school diver Ami (Masami Nagasawa) and swimmer Keisuke (Mokomichi Hayami) don't exactly get along. Their parents run rival sweets shops and Ami is long-time friends, and maybe more, with Keisuke's freestyle rival Hiroki (Tsuyoshi Abe). Over time, however, hostile words give way to hesitant attraction, leaving Ami torn between Keisuke and Hiroki. With the national championship coming up, the young swimmers are competing for more than the title, but also their hearts.

5.9/10

After being stricken with Alzheimer's disease in the prime of his life, a successful young businessman slips slowly away from his loving family in director Yukihiko Tstusumi's poignant family drama. Saeki (Ken Watanabe) is about to launch what promises to be the most successful advertising campaign in his burgeoning career. In addition to his astonishingly fast ascent up the corporate ladder, Saeki's beautiful young daughter is about to be married, and he will soon become a youthful grandfather.

7.4/10
8.6%

A series of short stories all about dogs.

6.9/10

A tale of delinquent and lazy school girls. In their efforts to cut remedial summer math class, they end up poisoning and replacing the schools brass band.

7.5/10

Takayuki (Takao Osawa) is an elementary school teacher in Tokyo. He is seized with Behçet's syndrome, and will gradually lose his sight. He resigns from his job and leaves his girlfriend, Yoko (Yuriko Ishida) to return to his hometown, Nagasaki, where his mother lives. Takayuki spends his days strolling around Nagasaki, to imprint familiar scenes on his memory. Yoko visits him and insists on staying. Takayuki has major concerns for her future, and his own life. He drives her away, for her own good. After days of affliction, the two reunite. The story leads to an emotive conclusion, the end of his spiritual journey.

6.3/10

Maiko is a 17 year old aspiring picture book writer who was abandoned by her widowed father at the age of 3 and has lived in a foster home ever since. She meets Lisa, also 17, and the two quickly form a bond of understanding as they help each other work out their problems. Lisa holds a grudge against her mother for paying more attention to the men she brings home than her own daughter and Maiko begins to doubt her artistic dream will ever come to fruition after a book editor judges her writing ability harshly.

7.4/10

Don't you want to meet with a woman who falls in love, likes to dress up, and arrests felonious offenses? What if she fights for outrageousness of the society with the sounds of the howling siren, and yet, enjoys her love life and friendship? This is how the 21st century-woman with strong will and gentleness would be like. And without doubt, attractive woman are to be surrounded by attractive guys.

7.4/10

Schoolgirl Kuniko is kidnapped by a middle-aged man Iwazono when she is jogging. He tells her that he had a failed marriage which leaves him a deep and everlasting scar in his mind. He kidnaps her in search of a perfect marriage and intends to lock her in the room and 'educate' her to perform perfect sex where body and soul are united.

5.6/10

Boy with time bomb standing on golden meadow

Two married couples struggle to cope with their sex lives. Kenji and Misaki, a seemingly happy married couple, lead a sexless life. Misaki, whose numerous seductions have been turned down by her husband Kenji, longs for a way to solve their sexless marriage. On the other hand, Shoko, a career oriented woman, is annoyed by the constant sexual attention she receives from her husband Yoshihiko, who believes fulfilling Shoko’s sexual needs is the greatest expression of love. When a chance meeting brings Kenji and Shoko together in a passionate affair, they suddenly find themselves re-examining their lives and struggling to understand what is truly important.

A man's soul (he is in a coma) must make a lonely woman happy or he will die on Christmas day.

8/10

Traveling chef Ryuji is called back to Tokyo to help save his late teacher’s restaurant. With the help of his close friend Kinu, Ryuji must complete the training of Wataru — the apprentice chosen by his late teacher to become the next master chef — in the art of culinary excellence and running a successful business.

A bored Japanese accountant sees a beautiful woman in the window of a ballroom dance studio. He secretly starts taking dancing lessons to be near her, and then over time discovers how much he loves ballroom dancing. His wife, meanwhile, has hired a private detective to find out why he has started coming home late smelling of perfume.

7.6/10
9.1%

Iuemon is left master less after his master, Lord Asano, attempts to kill the treacherous Lord Kira and out of desperation and due to the extreme poverty he now lives in, poisons his wife Oiwa and marries the daughter of one of Lord Kira's men. This comes back, literally, to haunt him.

6.2/10

Yoshinori sells plots of land in a cemetery, and is involved in a stale ten-year-old marriage with bored housewife Atsuko. When Atsuko makes a male friend at her leather-working class, Yoshinori has a fit. This is on top of the myriad of odd clients that he must appease.

A successful office lady, who has made herself sexually available to a doctor, has her routine disrupted when her former boyfriend's son appears in her life. She is not connected to the boy, but his father has been in an accident.

4.8/10

A messy bachelor's apartment is a paradise for the huge colony of cockroaches living there: no sprays, no traps, and plenty of food. When the homeowner's girlfriend moves in, however, the party comes to an abrupt end, and the roaches must quickly adapt to a life of struggling for survival. Combines animation with live actors.

6.6/10

Shohei Taguchi is a salaryman who works for a securities company and loves women like no other. One day, he plans to use the cash borrowed from the gangsters and snatch to repay his debt . However, Sayoko Mukai, who said that she used the money of the company for gambling , took over the money. Shohei and Sayoko plan a robbery and steal cash from the gallery, but another man steals it.

6/10

An anthology comprising of tales in modern Japan.

5.7/10

A 30-year-old man's life gets up-ended when his girlfriend accepts an arranged marriage meeting with a more successful man.

Stuck doing show-biz schlock, an investigative reporter stumbles on a scheme to swindle pensions through an attractive gold futures scam, a potential news-story.

6.8/10

Oshin is a Japanese serialized morning television drama, which aired on broadcaster NHK from April 4, 1983 to March 31, 1984. The series follows the life of Shin Tanokura during the Meiji period up to the early 1980s. Shin was called "Oshin", which is an archaic Japanese cognomen. In total, 297 15-minute episodes aired. In Japan, the annual average audience share was 52.6%, with a peak rating of 62.9% for a single episode. As of today, Oshin aired in 59 countries, with subtitles ranging from English to Arabic. In 1984, the earlier episodes of the drama were made into an animated movie by Sanrio. The movie reused Sugako Hashida's scripts and Ayako Kobayashi, who played young Oshin, did the voice of Oshin.

8.3/10

First mainstream film directed by Genji Nakamura, based on Yasutaka Tsutsui's 1974 short story of the same title.

6.5/10