Yamada Village Waltz

A tragedy strikes a young woman's life without warning or reason. She continues living while searching for meaning in a lonely world.

Fleeing heartbreak in the big city, Ichiko returns to Komori, her rural hometown. She battles summer's rain and humidity, bakes her own bread, grows hothouse tomatoes and tills the fields. During autumn, the time for pickling and preserving fish and sweet potatoes, Ichiko begins reaping rice and recalls her departure five years before.

A spell of time in the life of the five-piece Haruno family in rural Tochigi Prefecture. Yoshiko is not an ordinary housewife, instead working on an animated film project. Uncle Ayano, a successful music producer, is looking to get his head together after living in Tokyo. Meanwhile, Sachiko is concerned with why she seems to be followed by a giant version of herself. As the lazy days pass by, each member of the family is followed in a series of episodic vignettes.

A young newspaper writer returns to her hometown in the English countryside, where her childhood home is being prepped for sale.

In lyrical switches between the present and the past, Taeko contemplates the arc of her life, and wonders if she has been true to the dreams of her childhood self.

In a once-scenic village now dominated by a vast trash disposal site, a young man yearns to break free from a cruel fate tying him to the very grounds.

After failing his university entrance exam, Yuki Hirano sets his eyes on the role of a forestry trainee. Setting off for training he doubts his decision many times, but eventually after passing the training course, he is sent to Kamusari Village for a year of work experience - where he becomes assimilated with the beauty of nature and the warm-hearted people of the village.

Soyo, a student in a school with only six students, develops feelings for the new student, Hiromi, who has moved from Tokyo.

A married farmer falls under the spell of a slatternly woman from the city, who tries to convince him to drown his wife.

Ichiko bakes a cake for an end-of-year party with her friends. In the depths of winter, making mochi and curry keeps the people of Komori warm. Later, spring brings thoughts of her absent mother as well as rice planting and sakura, and she begins to think of leaving Komori behind again.

A humble and simple Takezo abandons his life as a knight errant. He's sought as a teacher and vassal by Shogun, Japan's most powerful clan leader. He's also challenged to fight by the supremely confident and skillful Sasaki Kojiro. Takezo agrees to fight Kojiro in a year's time but rejects Shogun's patronage, choosing instead to live on the edge of a village, raising vegetables. He's followed there by Otsu and later by Akemi, both in love with him. The year ends as Takezo assists the villagers against a band of brigands. He seeks Otsu's forgiveness and accepts her love, then sets off across the water to Ganryu Island for his final contest.

In post-WWII Osaka, a middle-aged woman is forced to examine her dreary life and marriage when her husband's young and flirtatious cousin arrives for a brief stay to escape an arranged marriage.