Nishikawa Tomonari

Nishikawa Tomonari was a Japanese filmmaker, curator, and academic. His films have been screened at numerous film festivals and art venues, including Berlinale, Edinburgh International Film Festival, Hong Kong International Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, London Film Festival,…

Uchida Issaku

Uchida Issaku was a Japanese film director and screenwriter from Kyoto, Japan. He was a member of the Directors Guild of Japan (日本映画監督協会). He graduated from the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Waseda University (早稲田大学) in 1946. Uchida joined Nikkatsu (日活) in 1954,…

Mayama Miho

Mayama Miho, born Mayama Mihoko (真山美保子) in Tokyo, Japan, was a Japanese playwright, actress, and director. She was the chairperson of the Shin Seisakuza Cultural Center (新制作座文化センター) and a member of the Japan Directors Association (日本演出家協会) and the International…

Yashiro Seiichi

Yashiro Seiichi was a Japanese playwright, screenwriter, and director born in Ginza, Tokyo. He was a member of the Japan Writers' Association (日本文芸家協会) and the Japan Theatre Association (日本演劇協会). He came from the third generation of the founding family of Ginza Yoshinoya (銀座ヨシノヤ).…

Ko Hideo

Ko Hideo, born Yoshida Hideo (吉田英男) in Tomari, Sakhalin, Russia, was a Japanese singer and actor. The youngest of eight siblings, he was adopted by his maternal aunt's family shortly after birth. Both his biological and adoptive families were involved in the paper industry and had connections…

Miyagi Kenji

Miyagi Kenji was a Japanese manzai (comic duo) performer, host, and actor who formed the comic duo "W Kenji" with Azuma Kenji. His real name was Terashima Fumio (寺島文雄). He was born in Okuma, Watari, Miyagi, Japan. In his later years, he was affiliated with Maseki Geinosha talent agency. At the…

Shimizu Hiroshi

Shimizu Hiroshi was a Japanese film director active during the Taisho and Showa periods in Japan. He was born in Nishiwataru, Yama-ka, Iwata, Shizuoka, Japan. Due to his parents' strained relationship, he was raised by his grandfather at his mother's family home upstream of the Tenryu River. His father…

Sawamura Sadako

Sawamura Sadako was a Japanese actress and essayist born in Saruwakacho, Asakusa, Tokyo, Japan. Her real name was Ohashi Teiko (大橋貞子). She was also known as an essayist, publishing memoirs such as "Song of Shells" and "My Asakusa." Her older brother, Tomokazu, became the fourth-generation Sawamura…

Shimura Ken

Ken Shimura (志村 けん, Shimura Ken) (born Yasunori Shimura (志村 康徳, Shimura Yasunori), February 20, 1950 – March 29, 2020) was a Japanese comedian. He co-starred with Masashi Tashiro, Nobuyoshi Kuwano in the Japanese variety show Shimura Ken no Bakatono-sama. He was known as "Japan's Robin…

Ikenami Shotaro

Ikenami Shotaro was a prominent Japanese novelist known for his historical fiction and period novels that depicted the post-war era in Japan. Besides his literary contributions, he was also renowned as a film critic, particularly fond of French cinema and film noir. He was born in Seitencho, Asakusa-ku,…

Mr. Crane Is Back

He San is released from prison after 15 years. During his time in, his parents passed away and his wife got re-married. He San surely had his imperfections. When he finds out that his son, who has changed his name,…

Tokyo Bay

Opening with an aerial pan over post-war Tokyo, a title card informs us that this is just one frame in the “intense struggle for existence” in a city of 10 million before we arrive at the titular bay and a boat…

Ning Yuan

For five hundred years, there has been a legend on Tianyou Continent that whoever gets the Lord of Hidden Mountain will get the world. Five hundred years have passed since the last Lord of Hidden Mountain, Mo Ning…

Back to the Year

Looking back, it was an alley mixed with popcorn and charcoal, half a piece of rubber handed over from the same table, the two or eight bars that the father passed through Liu Yin, the mother of the mother in front…

Charred Imori

There is an old woman begging at the foot of the drum bridge at the shrine, but a beautiful woman passes by. A man who has begun to see the beautiful woman buys an aphrodisiac "Imori no Kuroyaki" from a store near…

The Story of Lady Sook Young

A married couple lives happily together. One day, the husband leaves for Seoul to take his national exam and the wife waits for her husband to come back hoping that he passes the exam. Unfortunately, the wife stabs…

Hideko the Bus Conductor

7.5

Okoma, a witty young woman working as a conductor in an old, rickety bus in Kofu, Yamanashi, has a creative idea that could avert the dwindling number of passengers when her job and the bus company itself are at stake.…

Wedding Picture

Rim Sook Hyang and Ri Yeong Ho promised to defect together in North Korea. Sook Hyang defected to North Korea first, and Yeong Ho was caught by the security department while trying to defect a month later. Three years…

Beast

Mi Ae is an actress recognized by all Koreans and who is about to marry a third-generation chaebol. When she was young she was adopted by her adoptive parents after her biological parents committed suicide when she…

Ashita wa Nihonbare

A group of people travel through a mountain pass. When their jaunty bus unceremoniously breaks down, a bittersweet sadness overcomes the passengers as unexpected reunions take place, but nothing can be what it was…