Akitake Kôno

In mediaeval Japan a compassionate governor is sent into exile. His wife and children try to join him... (imdb)

Yukie, the well-bred daughter of a university professor, is shocked when her father is relieved of his post for his political teachings... (imdb)

Blind swordsman/masseuse Zatoichi befriends a young woman looking for her father, a village leader who has disappeared. As he helps her investigate the disappearance, Zatoichi also becomes involved with another young woman who is trying to help her brother, who has murdered someone at about the same time and place as the missing man was last seen. (imdb)

A fugitive lord and his bodyguards and followers, all disguised as monks, traverse a forest, where they must avoid capture and outsmart the border guards. (imdb)

Special Forces commander Captain Tadamori returns to Kyoto after successfully defeating the uprising of pirates in the western sea of Japan. But because the high courtiers dislike career soldiers gaining power and influence, they ignore the will of ex-Emperor Toba and refuse to reward the captain. (imdb)

In this government-suggested sequel, Sugata again grows as a judo master, and demonstrates his (and by extension, all Japanese) superiority to the foreign warrior. (imdb)

A film about two lovers destroyed by war.

Three bank robbers, Eijima, Nojiri, and Takasugi, flee the police and escape into the mountains. At an inn high in the Japanese Alps, Eijima and Nojiri encounter a young woman and her father, as well as Honda, a mountaineer. The inn folk do not realize their guests are wanted criminals and the visitors are treated with great kindness. Honda volunteers to lead them over the mountains, but Eijima's paranoia endangers all of them as they make the perilous trip. (imdb)

Another period piece, with legendary characters and vaguely martial overtones. The script has some wit, and the screenwriter makes a small effort to give the characters dimension, but there's really not much that Naruse can do with this material, other that create beautiful deep-space compositions for the exterior shots. (Dan Sallitt)

A nobleman writes a letter to the Shogun detailing a tobacco smuggling operation in Edo, but the smugglers kill him before he sends it. His daughter obtains the letter and swears revenge on those responsible.

A young blind girl is abandoned by her mother. When her guardian is killed, she learns to wield a sword from a traveling Ronin. She travels to seek her mother and her revenge. (imdb)

Before government censorship was instituted full force in 1928, the proletarian novel was the ascendant form in Japanese prose. Takiji Kobayashi was the leading writer in this genre, which attempted to expose the oppression of the lower classes, until he was murdered in prison by the government in 1933. So Yamamura's The Crab-Canning Ship is based on one of Kobayashi's better-known novels. A group of sailors is forced to work under unbearable conditions on a Japanese fishing vessel.

This is a classic early Japanese Ninja movie. The Iga ninjas are a dying breed as Toyotomis rule allows Japan to experience some peace. Juzo, an Iga ninja who had vowed revenge for the death of his family, is hired by a rich weapons merchant to assassinate Toyotomi, restarting his quest for blood. In his way are rival ninja, and his once best friend who has decided to become a government vassal. The main plot centers around the conflicts that confront Juzo... (imdb)

Yagyu Jubei proves his skills in this early adventure film (The Movie Database)

The story of an airport and its air traffic control crew in a remote and northern Japanese town. Three of the air traffic controllers are female with one of them (Hara, Setsuko) working with her dead fiance's sister. The engaged man had gone to war and never returned. (The Movie Database)

Omnibus of love stories from 1947 directed by famous directors, featuring big stars. (The Movie Database)

Based on Matsumoto Seicho's classic mystery novel of the same name, the story centers around a group of detectives who are determined to find the truth behind an apparent double suicide. (The Movie Database)

Toward the Decisive Battle in the Sky describes the challenging training of young boys in the Yokaren, a program feeding new pilots into the Army and Navy. By the time of the filming, the pressure of the war had led the government to shorten the training and expand the age range of the recruits. Yokaren was highly selective, and thus an object of great fascination and desire for boys and young men. In this Navy–sponsored film, ... (letterboxd)

Three IJN flyers Mikami (Susumu Fujita), Kawakami (Masayuki Mori) and Murakami (Akitake Kono) are good friends, and they are all renowned for their torpedo techniques. Mikami is posted as a staff officer at a base on an island in the Pacific. Kawakami and Murakami later joins him as the base squardron is reinforced. The enemy task force approaches the island and all three of them attack the fleet, killing themselves in the process. (imdb)

Strongly anti-war film based on the collection of writings by Japanese student soldiers who died during World War II. The location is Burma. It shows the everyday problems of soldiers in contrast of their ideas and the cynicism of their commanders.

Story of a beautiful blind daughter of a wealthy businessman who falls in love with a servant.

It is 1921 and a town has a newspaper which prints urgent bulletins as required. The Washington-based CITES treaty, in which Japan participates, puts a limit on the number of warships any country can possess. As a result, Japan has to decommission a ship to its makers' disappointment. An institute of technology's laboratory designs a new ship. Due to fewer ships, sailors have to retire and are also disappointed...

1st film in a series of 8.