Kyôichi Satô
Three men sentenced to death are spared and changed into “shadows executioners”, a group of ruthless ninja working for mysterious high ranking officials. During their investigation on some illegal business, one of them, called “Yazuke the Viper”, finds his abandoned daughter, Ocho, who has now become a mistress of Denzo, a smuggler. After Yazuke’s death, Ocho is also recruited as a “shadows executioner”, with the task of completing her father’s mission.
Set in the icy wilderness of Hokkaido during the early days of the Meiji era, where the brutal warden of Kabato Prison terrorizes convicts sentenced to forced labor to build the roads needed to open up the territory.
The quiet life of a mother and her young son living on a farm in Hokkaido is changed by the arrival of a man who ignites flames of romance in the heart of the mother and shows her boy the importance of grit and kindness, but then he leaves with the autumn wind...
Kumokiri Nizaemon, a former samurai warrior, has abandoned his class to become the leader of a gang of thieves. He leads his outlaws in an attempt to rob the castle of his former clan.
A bad cop is engaged in a violent chase to catch a yakuza boss. In his absence his wife runs away with another man, who turns out to be the very same man that her husband is hunting. Once he discovers this, he loses his nerve and turns in his badge. But the chase turns into a personal vendetta where the ex-cop plans to wipe out the entire gang.
A karate master played by Sonny Chiba is attacked and left crippled and blinded in one eye. He trains his daughter (Etsuko Shihomi) with the intention of her avenging not only himself but a murdered friend.
Japan, 1948: Hiroki Matsukata stars as a man facing a nine year prison sentence. He incites prisoners of Shimane Prison to the biggest riot in jail history. A fighter by heart, he sees a way out of any situation, but will he survive this, the gutsiest assault ever attempted?
In the sixth and final film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, the final conflict between Ogami Itto and the Yagyu clan is carried out.
The sixth chapter of Jingi Naki Tatakai series With the endless power struggle. The extraordinary combination of Kinji Fukasaku and Bunta Sugawara, along with new ideas and a strong touch of realism, created the sixth movie of the series that describes 'The War of Hiroshima Gangsters' which had lasted almost 30 years after World War II. It can be called the Japanese secret post WWII history. It focuses on the ugly, violent inside struggle of the Yamamori Group of 1959 in Kure City, Hiroshima. Director Kinji Fukasaku, the master of portraying violence and humanity, said "Having making the five previous movies, I found those characters very interesting. So I took a deeper look into them this time." He made this shocking movie with high enthusiasm and revealed the core of gangster's struggle which has never been touched before.
With a Kansai syndicate setting their sights on Tokyo, a former yakuza boss gets dragged back into a world of violence.
When a rebellious roughneck enlists in the Navy and goes on a rampage against his superiors, he is sent to the Yokosuka Naval Prison.
In the fifth film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, Ogami Itto is challenged by five warriors, each has one fifth of Ogami's assassin fee and one fifth of the information he needs to complete his assassination.
When 150 guns are stolen from Iwakuni base and two police officers are shot dead, a detective criminal tries to find out the truth.
Teruo Ishii's Bohachi Bushido: Code of the Forgotten Eight tells the story of a Ronin with a death wish who reluctantly joins the Clan of the Forgotten Eight, a nasty crew of ronin who are wrapped up in a clan war over local prostitution. Teturo Tanba is well cast as the ronin who just wants to die in battle but does a good job taking a lot of gangsters with him. Drug trips, naked geisha and plenty of sword action make up this Teruo Ishii pinky violence film.
Matsu, known to the prisoners as Scorpion, is locked away in the bowels of the prison as revenge for disrupting the smooth operation of the prison and for her disfiguring attack on the warden. Granted a one day reprieve due to the visit of a dignitary, she takes advantage and attacks the warden again. This leads to more brutal punishment and humiliation. But the punishment gives her an oppurtunity to escape along with six other female prisoners. Their surreal flight from prison pits the convicts against the guards, the warden and each other.
In this first film of the Lone Wolf and Cub series, adapted from the manga by Kazuo Koike, we are told the story of the Lone Wolf and Cub's origin. Ogami Itto, the official Shogunate executioner, has been framed for disloyalty to the Shogunate by the Yagyu clan, against whom he now is waging a one-man war, along with his infant son, Daigoro.
The third movie following the exploits of bounty hunter Shikoro Ichibei. The theft of almost a half ton of gold from the shogunate's official mine threatens to bankrupt the government of Japan. Despite a desperate search the gold has not been found, causing officials of the Tokugawa bakufu to call on their most skillful secret agent, Shikoro Ichibei.
Zatoichi is a blind massage therapist and swordsman who finds out that something troubling is taking place on the outskirts of town. After discovering who the guilty parties are -- an accomplished Chinese martial artist named Wang Kang and his youthful attendant -- Zatoichi finds them and discovers that the pair's mixed up with a dangerous bunch of terrorist samurai who murdered the boy's parents. Now, Zatoichi must step in to save the day.
Exciting fight of a secret police detective over secret of a diamond.
Ryotatsu, the wayward Priest blinded by Shinkai, the Wicked Priest, has his own story in this ultra-violent tale from the era of the Meiji Reconstruction. When a woman leaves her blind son at the Monastery, Ryotatsu is forced to teach the boy how to cope as a blind person in old Japan. When he takes the child with him on the road to find the boy's mother, they run afoul of not only yakuza gangsters, but some corrupt army officers have been trying to sway public opinion against the Satsuma rebels by posing as members of Saigo Takamori's group. It's a bloody mistake for them to underestimate the strength of the Blind Priest, and he'll make them pay with their lives!
Fresh out of jail, a smart-mouth wise guy Goro takes the name “Big Brother Katsumata.” Not fitting in well with established gangs, he forms a rag-tag gang called “the Shinjuku Brothers.” The members of their gang are thugs who only wish they were traditional yakuza. When they turn up at the funeral for a gangster, they are not welcomed, but a senior boss intervenes to keep things calm. The boss of bosses invites them to join a respected local council of warlords. Katsumata is suspicious of why such powerful men would extend an invitation to lowlife like himself.
Suehiro Katsuji, a prisoner of Abashiri, is sent to Shikoku to work at a dock where a fierce turf battle takes place between a local gang and the dock operator.
A private detective is hired to find a missing man by his wife. While his search is unsuccessful, the detective's own life begins to resemble the man for whom he is searching.
The Stranger comes across some bad guys trying to kill a Japanese emissary for a very important scroll. Before the emissary dies, he asks The Stranger to return the scroll to Japan. Once there he finds himself stuck in the middle of two rival clans and decides to play them off one against each other to free the town.
Japanese sixties comedy featuring a cunning female jewel thief named Black Lizard who tries to kidnap Sanaye, a wealthy jeweler's beautiful daughter as part of a plot to steal the jeweler's expensive "Star of Egypt" diamond. To thwart the planned kidnapping, the jeweler hires Japan's number one detective, the brilliant Akechi. This sets off a dual between Black Lizard and Akechi as each tries to outwit the other. In the process, the two adversaries develop a mutual respect and affection for each other. Despite Akechi's efforts, Black Lizard and her crew are able to kidnap Sanaye and gain possession of the "Star of Egypt". Black Lizard takes Sanaye to her secret lair on a remote island which is populated by an eerie collection of naked human dolls. There Black Lizard plans to preserve Sanaye's beauty forever by turning her into one of her dolls. As Sanaye's doom quickly approaches, it is up to Akechi to save the day.
The lord of the Oshi fief is killed by his trespassing neighbour, the cruel and despotic Nariatsu, son of the former Shogun. After an investigation, the Oshi clan is blamed for what happened and sentenced to be disbanded. Eleven of the best samurai of the clan refuse the sentence and are willing to give their life for justice.
Kiba Okaminosuke finds himself entangled with a group of prisoners being transported to their executions, one of whom oddly looks exactly like his dead father. There are crooked gold miners, a beautiful girl who is unfortunately a complete lunatic and a dojo master who is obsessed with killing Kiba just to prove that his school's sword style is the best.
Famous enka singer Saburo Kitajima stars as Katsuji, a traveling craps artist who finds great camaraderie on the road.
This is the story of a vagrant samurai – the solitary, savage and scrupulous Kiba – who arrives at a village to defend a beautiful, blind woman against a sinister plot. Her assailants then send against him another samurai, named Sana, who is without scruples. The fight between them will become personal, for the honor and love of the blind woman.
Loyal samurai Samanosuke is attacked, mutilated, and left for dead while carrying out a mission for his clan. He recovers but has lost an eye and an arm. Taking a new identity as Tange Sazen, he searches for a stolen urn which has hidden significance to his clan. But Tange Sazen has his own reasons for seeking the urn.
Legendary swordplay filmmaker Hideo Gosha's Sword of the Beast chronicles the flight of the low-level swordsman Gennosuke, who kills one of his ministers as part of a reform plot. His former comrades then turn on him, and this betrayal so shakes his sense of honor that he decides to live in the wild, like an animal. There he joins up with a motley group who are illegally mining the shogun’s gold, and, with the aid of another swordsman, gets a chance not just at survival but to recover his name and honor.
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.
Shiba, a wandering ronin, encounters a band of peasants who have kidnapped the daughter of their dictatorial magistrate, in hopes of coercing from him a reduction in taxes. Shiba takes up their fight, joined by two renegades from the magistrate's guard, Sakura and Kikyo. The three outlaws find themselves in a battle to the death.
Action drama about a Japanese gangster in Manchuria circa 1932, who finally joins some Chinese mountain bandits.
