Fumio Hayasaka
Series
Language
日本語
Description
A bad day gets worse for rookie detective Murakami when a pickpocket steals his gun on a hot, crowded bus. Desperate to right the wrong, he goes undercover, scavenging Tokyo's sweltering streets for the thief, whose desperation has led him to a life of crime. With each step, the cop and the criminal's lives become more intertwined and the investigation becomes an examination of Murakami's own dark side.
Language
日本語
Description
Discovering that he is in the terminal stages of cancer, a clerk spends his last months in search of the meaning to life. After his pursuit of pleasure has failed, he finds self-realization in bringing about the building of a children's playground in the slums and dies quiety fulfilled.
3) Ugetsu
Series
Criterion collection volume 309
Language
日本語
Formats
Description
"By the time he made Ugetsu, Kenji Mizoguchi was already an elder statesman of Japanese cinema, fiercely revered by Akira Kurosawa and other younger directors of a younger generation. And with this exquisite ghost story, a fatalistic wartime tragedy derived from stories by Akinari Ueda and Guy de Maupassant, he created a touchstone of his art, his long takes and sweeping camera guiding the viewer through a delirious narrative about two villagers whose...
4) Ikiru
Series
Criterion collection volume 221
Language
日本語
Description
A young Japanese businessman dying of cancer wants to give something back to society before his death, so he decides to build a playground for children.
5) Rashōmon
Series
Criterion collection volume 138
Language
日本語
Description
"A riveting psychological thriller that investigates the nature of truth and the meaning of justice, Rashomon is widely considered one of the greatest films ever made. Four people recount different versions of the story of a man's murder and the rape of his wife, which director Akira Kurosawa presents with striking imagery and an ingenious use of flashbacks. This eloquent masterwork and international sensation revolutionized film language and introduced...
6) Ikiru
Series
Criterion collection volume 221
Language
日本語
Description
A young Japanese businessman dying of cancer wants to give something back to society before his death, so he decides to build a playground for children.
Series
Criterion collection volume 949
Language
日本語
Description
"One of a string of late-career masterworks made by Kenji Mizoguchi in the first half of the 1950s, A Story from Chikamatsu (a.k.a. The Crucified Lovers) is an exquisitely moving tale of forbidden love struggling to survive in the face of persecution. Based on a classic of eighteenth-century Japanese drama, the film traces the injustices that befall a Kyoto scroll maker's wife and his apprentice after each is unfairly accused of wrongdoing. Bound...
Series
Criterion collection volume 2
Language
日本語
Description
This epic masterpiece is about a group of 16th century samurai who are hired to defend a small Japanese village that finds itself annually raided by an army of bandits who steal the meager crops harvested by the peasants. Tired of relinquishing their food supply but woefully inept in combat skills, the villagers decide to hire a band of samurai to protect them. In addition to the primary conflict between the villagers and the bandits, much of the...
Series
Criterion collection volume 2
Language
日本語
Description
Tells the story of a sixteenth-century village whose desperate inhabitants hire seven out-of-work warriors to protect them from invading bandits.