Kuniko Igawa
In a time of continuous civil wars ravaging the fields of feudal Japan, the eldest son of a very poor peasant family, living alongside the bridge over the Fuefuki river, decides to serve a warlord to escape his miserable condition, being soon followed by his younger brothers. Although not all the men of the family take this tragic path of death, women of the family will be doomed to endure the pain of loss during the next five generations.
After surviving the double suicide pact she made with her lover, a woman gives birth to their child.
The story of the trials and tribulations of a lighthouse keeper and his wife.
A young widow, made world weary by her abusive, neglectful husband, finds herself in a minor scandal when she's seen with her intense, no-nonsense childhood sweetheart.
Schoolteacher Hisako Oishi struggles to imbue her students with a positive view of the world despite the fact that war is looming.
A student at a woman's university takes a controversial action against the school's old-fashioned doctrines.
A sad and troubled man finds a new job five years after the end of WWII, where he writes love letters for other people.
A girl who'd left her hometown for the exciting adventure of the big city returns home years later for a visit, soon somehow causing scandal.
Noriko lives in postwar Tokyo with her extended family. Although she enjoys her career and her friends, her more traditionally minded family worries about the fact that she's still single at the advanced age of 28. When 40-year-old business associate Takako proposes marriage, Noriko's family press her into accepting. But when her widowed childhood friend Kenkichi returns to the neighborhood, she finds her heart leading in another direction.
The mistress of a crook real estate broker comes to terms with her soulless existence after an artist paints her portrait.
A young man who is unable to tell his childhood friend how he feels makes a pledge with her to reveal all of their secrets during the upcoming festival.
A lawyer fights doggedly for a more just legal system to rid Japan of its draconian penal system.
The few residents left on the streets in Tokyo share their individual stories and come to understand the melancholy of saying goodbye.
A wealthy family will not allow the military to grow crops on their fields due to their superstitious beliefs about their son's illness.
After the death of her husband, Mrs Toda and her youngest daughter receive a frosty welcome from the extended family.
Kinuyo is a daughter of rice cracker shop in downtown. She fell in love with her sister's boyfriend. It is a story whose theme is warm human relationships in a town of customs and manners.
A young yakuza student is led back to the straight and narrow path by his uncle.
