Kazuyoshi Okuyama

First major English-language documentary profile of the cult Japanese actor/director, Takeshi Kitano. Featuring interviews with many of his regular contributors and colleagues, the film explores Kitano's rise from working-class poverty to superstar of Japanese radio, TV, comedy and journalism, and follows the making of his US-Japanese gangster film, 'Brother'.

In Harari-cho, a small and quiet bayside town by the sea, the firemen have not seen a fire for nearly twenty years. Each day passes eventlessly... until one day. The monotony of their daily lives is interrupted by the appearance of a beautiful female college student, Momoko, who comes to visit her aunt. After catching a glimpse of Momoko, both Tatsuya and Nobuyuki can't stop thinking about her. Since then, the small town is not so quiet anymore…

When lightning strikes a theater about to close its doors, three moviegoers are thrust back in time to the world inside the screen.

Years after she related to him the story of her parents’ death in a fire, for which – rightly or wrongly – she feels responsible, Japanese psychiatrist Dr. Sanada meets his former patient Azusa once again. Back then, she lambasted him for being wrong for the job. Back then, he let slip that she isn’t actually crazy. Now she’s a prostitute living in precarious circumstances in Los Angeles and is accused of murder, with her memories once again moving inexorably towards a fire. Sanada assesses her in the presence of an investigator who appears not to understand Japanese. Is Azusa now mentally ill for real? Was she back then? And why does the description of her tormentors upset him so?

A young girl befriends an infant T-rex after her paleontologist father nurtures a lair of lost dinosaur eggs.

The indolent son of an oil vendor becomes a regular customer of a prostitute, racks up a mountain of debt, and is disowned by his parents.

The world's first human-android acting duo, called Android Theater Project, is the collaborative brainchild of noted Japanese playwright Oriza Hirata and the leading robotics scientist Hiroshi Ishiguro. "Sayonara" is a remakable android play and has been adapted to feature film by the acclaimed filmmaker Koji Fukada (Hospitalité, Au revoir l’été). In this film project the setting of the story is largely expanded, depicting time and space in a way which can only be achieved in film, examining life and death though the communication between dying human and immortal android.

Five women snatch one billion yen in jewellery from the yakuza, while construction manager Toyama burns for revenge against the mobsters who raped and caused the death of his wife. Before long, the yakuza and Toyama arrive at the women's hideout.

Edogawa Rampo is a writer whose latest work is censored by the government, deemed too disturbing and injurious to the public to be allowed to be published. However, after burning his drafts, his publisher shows him a newspaper with an account of events just like his forbidden story. As the film progresses, fantasy and reality intermingle in a tale that draws heavily on influences from Poe and Stoker's Dracula. The film's strongly Expressionistic direction skillfully combines a variety of media (animation, computer-generated imagery, grainy black-and-white fast film stock, color negatives) for artistic effect.

Edogawa Rampo is a writer whose latest work is censored by the government, deemed too disturbing and injurious to the public to be allowed to be published. However, after burning his drafts, his publisher shows him a newspaper with an account of events just like his forbidden story. As the film progresses, fantasy and reality intermingle in a tale that draws heavily on influences from Poe and Stoker's Dracula. The film's strongly Expressionistic direction skillfully combines a variety of media (animation, computer-generated imagery, grainy black-and-white fast film stock, color negatives) for artistic effect.

No synopsis available yet.

A drama depicting the conflict between a man that ran to an old lover suffering from advanced leukemia, his wife and child that were left behind, and the friendship that develops between his wife and his former lover.

At a Japanese school, a desperate student council struggles with a recurring problem. The aggressive and relentless members of the Yagyu biker gang stop by the school each semester to beat up the kids, steal their lunch money and vandalize their belongings. The kids want to fight back but realize they're too weak and undermanned against the bikers, and so they hire a handful of tough gals to train and defend them.

In the last days of the Tokugawa shogunate, there was a cute warrior, Souji Okita, who belonged to the armed police of the shogunate in Kyoto. Very few knew that Souji was not a boy, but a woman. Souji loved the vice-leader of the armed police, Toshizou Hijikata. Souji suffered from pulmonary tuberculosis and coughed up blood during a battle. Toshizou helped her but said that he did not care for the girl with a smell of blood. Souji had a real talent for swordsmanship and no one but Ryouma Sakamoto could compete with her. Ryouma was a liberal intellectual and tried to carry out a revolution without blood. However, the bloody Meiji Restoration broke out and Souji killed Ryouma who lost his dream. Because a friendship had sprung up between Toshizou and Ryouma, Toshizou got angry and slashed at Souji with a sword. Unwillingly, she unsheathed her sword and thought that she might get love if she was killed by the man she loved.

Keiichi (Kenichi Hagiwara) is a weather man. He gets involved with two married women, Yoshiko (Mitsuko Baisho) and Miyoko (Chieko Baisho). Both want to divorce but are trapped in meaningless marriages. While being undecided of who he wants to chose, Keiichi witnesses passions boil to an unforgiving climax.

A small time Yakuza thug is thrown into a bloody battle after a bank robbery he was forced into goes wrong when all the men begin to turn on each other a hitch-hiking serial killing couple decide to steal their loot.

Faraway Sunset tells the story of the famed bacteriologist who is known to have discovered the agent that cause syphilis, and for his relentless search for a cure to yellow fever. As a toddler, his mother's neglect had caused an accident to his left hand, fusing together all the fingers in a bizarre twist of fate. Naturally extremely remorseful for being the cause of her son's handicap, she does everything she could to ensure that he gets to lead a normal life, despite having to fend off bullies and unfair prejudices.

Satoko Watabe, who calls herself Erica was organizing business support meetings, and collecting a fortune with a fictional investment story, under the order of her lover Ikuo Hirasawa. But she finds out that Hirasawa was actually dating multiple women and was betraying her. Once she cuts contact with Hirasawa, she seduces a rich old man, and obtains a luxurious house. She invites her mother who is in a care home to come live with her, and starts her own fictional “business support” sessions to defraud people. During her visit to Thailand, she meets a young man Porche. Erica falls in love, and enjoys her honeymoon. But the police were looming right around the corner...

No synopsis available yet.

A woman walks menacingly through the crowds in a city. She eventually arrives at an old Western-style house, which she remembers is a psychiatric clinic she has been to in the past, and she lies on a recliner and begins to tell the story of her tragic life…

A woman walks menacingly through the crowds in a city. She eventually arrives at an old Western-style house, which she remembers is a psychiatric clinic she has been to in the past, and she lies on a recliner and begins to tell the story of her tragic life…

Time Traveling Samurai

No synopsis available yet.

No synopsis available yet.

A journalist exposes the current whereabouts of perpetrators involved in a past mass lynching murder case, triggering the resurfacing of another sealed murder case. The film explores human desire, jealousy, and the nature of atonement throughout this process.