Mitsuko Mito

In 16th century Japan, peasants Genjuro and Tobei sell their earthenware pots to a group of soldiers in a nearby village, in defiance of a local sage's warning against seeking to profit from warfare. Genjuro's pursuit of both riches and the mysterious Lady Wakasa, as well as Tobei's desire to become a samurai, run the risk of destroying both themselves and their wives, Miyagi and Ohama.

The few residents left on the streets in Tokyo share their individual stories and come to understand the melancholy of saying goodbye.

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.

Genji, the illegitimate offspring of a Japanese potentate, goes by the philosophy of "love 'em and leave 'em" as a matter of course. Only when his heart is broken by Awaji does Genji realizes how much pain he himself has caused.

After years on the road establishing his reputation as Japan's greatest fencer, Takezo returns to Kyoto. Otsu waits for him, yet he has come not for her but to challenge the leader of the region's finest school of fencing. To prove his valor and skill, he walks deliberately into ambushes set up by the school's followers.

Two college girls who work part-time as shrine maidens swap their names with private investigators conducting a marriage background check, throwing their boyfriends into total chaos.

As Japan's war of aggression against China intensifies, beginning with the Nanjing Massacre in December 1937, Kohei, who had secretly married Junko, the second daughter of the Godai family, deploys to the front lines, witnessing the atrocities of the Japanese army firsthand. Meanwhile, Shunsuke also takes to the front lines of the battlefield, engaging in a fierce battle against the Soviet army at Nomonhan.

Shuhei Horikawa, a poor schoolteacher, struggles to raise his son Ryohei by himself, despite neither money nor prospects.

Struggling to elevate himself from his low caste in 17th century Japan, Miyamoto trains to become a mighty samurai warrior.

Japanese suspense film.

Melodrama about a young woman who saves a young man from the world of evil after he has saved her from blindness.

Pu Zhe, younger brother of the Emperor of Manchukuo, marries Ryuko, daughter of an aristocratic family. To the surprise of all, a deep love between Pu Zhe and Ryuko develops and is put to the test when Japan loses the war.

In Depression-era Japan, a courteous bus driver carries an eclectic group of passengers from the mountainous Izu to Tokyo.

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Yoshida Denkichi does loses sight of his wife Chiyoko and daughter Toyoko during the war, and is taken in by a familiar woman, Oshige, and becomes the owner of "Fujimura" in the town of Hato. Eiko is a timid woman who hates Terada, a watchmaker who is obsessed with her; Tamie is a hard worker who asks for money from customers to support her mother and daughter Teruko; Tane, who dreams of the day they can be together, gives money to her lover Takeda; Machiko, an apres girl, is selective about her customers in the name of romance. They are women working in the red light district at "Fujimura."

The upstart Godai family conglomerate plans to strengthen ties with the hardliners in the Kwantung Army as they plan military expansion into Manchuria.

A sweet and melancholy melodrama set against the backdrop of the beautiful Seto Inland Sea, in which a pair of twin sisters, one a young lady of high birth, the other a maid, are manipulated by the threads of fate as they vie for the affection of the same young man.

As the Japanese military has established the puppet state of Manchukuo and is advancing its invasion of Asia, fighting intensifying battles against anti-Japanese partisans, the Godai zaibatsu becomes involved in large-scale opium smuggling. Shunsuke, second son of the Godai family, falls in love with a married woman. Meanwhile, Kohei, the love of the second daughter, Junko, throws himself into the anti-war movement.

Not far from Yurakucho, on the riverbank, stands the Nishida Clinic, with signs advertising internal medicine, surgery, and gynecology. The examination room of the clinic’s director, Dr. Heizo Nishida, is frequented by mysterious women and black-marketeers. Toshio Shimamura, president of “Seiso Shinpo”, takes notice of this. Ayako Toda, who lost her parents during repatriation and was taken in by Shimamura is ordered to extort 50,000 yen from Nishida, but in the process meets his son Ippei.

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After a broken heart, the woman lives a lonely life in a dormitory, while the man is now a popular singer at the height of his fame.

Hikaru Genji, the haunted romantic hero of Lady Murasaki Shikibu’s “Genji Monogatari” (Tale of Genji) comes to life in this new tale of his further romantic adventures. Young Genji, the emperor’s illegitimate son cuts a swath through the women of the imperial court, while still mourning the spirit of his late mother who died while he was still a child. Driven to an obsession with the emperor’s new concubine, Lady Fujitsubo, whose resemblance to his late mother originally caught the eye of the emperor, young Genji embarks upon a reckless affair with her that could cost him his life.

A bizarre duel on a snowy night with a woman at stake, a sudden and brazen murder, and a thrilling chase of love and passion.

A talent scout moves sharply, dead-set on signing a promising baseball player to The Toyko Flowers.

A man driven mad amid the ravages of war, a woman who never found true love, and an innocent young man—all drawn once again to the military port now returned to peace.

Movie about biological mothers, foster mothers, and stepmothers.

Tomoraka Tasaka's first postwar work.

A young man, convicted of a crime and imprisoned in the penitentiary, comes to believe that his wife is being unfaithful to him. He contrives his escape from the prison in order to seek her out and learn the truth, but the police give chase and he must flee into the mountains.

The sweet but naive denizens of a charming port town are hoodwinked by a couple of con men at the outset of World War II. But the hustlers’ plan backfires when they come down with severe cases of conscience. Keisuke Kinoshita’s directorial debut is a breezy, warmhearted, and often very funny crowd-pleaser that’s a testament to the filmmaker’s faith in people.

Kazuo, a Japanese army intelligence agent, reveals a foreign intelligence network in Japan and then sent to Borneo Island with a special mission.

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No description available.

Japanese Warmovie

1956 Daiei movie

The story tells of Tsuchiya, a university professor and a widower who is in love with a widow who runs a small restaurant, and his son is in love with a runaway girl who turns out to be the leader of a religious sect. Kusano is the henpecked proprietor of a rice biscuit shop who dreams of owning a bird and dog shop and his daughter is in love with a boarder, employed by the private detective agency searching for the runaway girl. The agency head has his own dream of arranging thirty marriages and has already accomplished twenty-seven. Tatsumi is a newspaper reporter who dreams of a big scoop to enable him to marry a girl TV producer and his friend a mountain climbing enthusiast who dreams of joining a Himalayan expedition but is opposed by his wife. His love of the mountains is shared by a boarder in their home and by a fishmonger's son.

Early film directed by Kenji Misumi.

Follows the story of an insurance company executive from Tokyo, Mr. Mito, who is demoted to the Osaka office. He takes a room at a small inn and tries to rebuild his life.

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In 1880s Japan, women's struggle for equality rages on. Eiko Hirayama leaves Okayama for Tokyo, where she helps the fledgling Liberal Party and falls in love with its leader Kentaro Omoi, just as the party is being disbanded by the government.

Japanese war film.

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This drama centers on an elderly politician and depicts how humans can return to their true selves when they are freed from selfish desires and self-interest.

Suzuko, a woman in her twenties who has a brother with political problems (due to communist reprisals), lives for over five years in a love affair with Tate who's a young lieutenant in the Army, ultimately becoming a right-wing fundamentalist revolutionary. She marries another man, one totally dedicated to the rigorous practices of Noh theatre, in an arranged marriage, but the bond that connects her with Tate is too strong.

Contemporary musical drama film by Yasuzo Masumura.

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A lifetime story of a woman who stubbornly lives in a poor mountain village in post-war Japan.

An intellectual couple in a staid and tedious marriage are surprised when the wife’s niece, who has run away from home, turns up unexpectedly to stay with them. Their mundane lives are sent into disarray by the emotional and energetic Ako.

Hibari no komoriuta (ひばりの子守唄, literally "Hibari's Lullaby") is a 1951 black-and-white Japanese film directed by Koji Shima. The movie is based on Das doppelte Lottchen, a novel later adapted as The Parent Trap.

A 1959 Yoshiaki Bansho adaptation of an Osaragi Jiro story.

The film depicts how the work to build the Great Buddha overcame a number of obstacles as proponents and opponents clashed over the construction of the Buddha. This work is based on a play by Hideo Osada, which was performed by the Shin Kyodo Theater Company in 1940.

A sequel to Ohana han.

Drama which shows the struggle of Fumiko, a female teacher, at work and at home.

Chuji Kunisada runs into strange adventures which tests his skill as a samurai as he untangles intrigue and murder against the backdrop of the majestic Mount Akagi.

1962 Japanese movie

1948 Japanese movie

Adaptation of Kishida Kunio's novel. Set against the backdrop of a power struggle within a hospital, depicts the love lives of the director's daughter, the administrative director, a doctor, and a nurse.

Tokyo, 1890. Through avarice, a series of misunderstandings, and failures of courage, the engagement of Kan-ichi (a student) and Miya (the daughter of Kan-ichi's debtor) is canceled to enable Miya to marry Tomiyama, a wealthy banker's son. In bitter despair, Kan-ichi breaks with his friends, drops his studies, and declares he has ceased to be human. He apprentices to a money-lender, and he's soon ruthless and wealthy. Several years later, Miya's in misery, her husband mistreats her. She goes to Kan-ichi to beg forgiveness; he pushes her away. He's now pursued by Akagashi, herself a cold-hearted loan shark. Can anything free Kan-ichi's hard heart from the golden demon

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Kondo Isami, the “Devil” commander of the Shinsengumi was one of Japan’s greatest national heroes and a peerless swordsman who devoted his life to protecting the shogun and fighting on the side of the Tokugawa. This tells the story of the Shinsengumi starting at the moment of their greatest triumph through the final battles as the Tokugawa shogunate was brought down.

A woman becomes dissatisfied with her marriage and joins a political theater troupe to protest the U.S. Security Pact.

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A ghost story about a woman who dies a violent death and appears to the man she loves as a vengeful spirit. This film marked the turning point in Daiei's shift in emphasis from thrillers to ghost stories.

Sixth film in the long-running series Daiei Studio's Woman Gambler with Kyoko Enami starring where she plays the woman gambler Ogin.

This is a film adaptation of a popular NHK drama that depicts a strong-willed woman, Hana, who lives a lively life while being swept up in the waves of the Meiji, Taisho, and Showa eras.

A young doctor, Kozo Tsumura, falls for young nurse Katsue Takaishi. But she's got a secret: she's a widow with a son. Kozo and Katsue decide to run away to Kyoto, but her child suddenly became sick and she just missed the train and Kozo. She makes it to Kyoto finally, but is unable to meet him. Plus she isn't accepted into Kyoto society. She goes back to her hometown and tries to forget him. She quits the hospital to concentrate on her singing. She makes her professional debut with the hit "Aizen Katsura". Kozo is in the audience.

Otama, daughter of a poor candy vendor, becomes the mistress of a man whom she believes to be a widower and owner of a prosperous dry goods store. The man is in fact married with children, and is a despised loan shark who takes money from the poor without qualms. Totally enraptured with Otama, this usurer establishes her and her father in separate houses and generously gives them gifts including silk taken as interest from Oshige, a poor cloth dealer who does business with the sewing teacher, Otama's neighbor. Otama's satisfaction with her situation gradually crumbles as she discovers the truth about her benefactor.

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Shogi, a Japanese form of chess, is a game that requires skill and determination. When poor sandal-maker Sakata decides to pursue his dream of becoming the Shogi Grand Master Champion, everything is at stake – including his family. What will it cost for Sakata to follow his passion?

Japanese life during the past thirty-five turbulent years is depicted in this film through the eyes of two police detectives. One is Henmi, who comes to Tokyo in 1926 from faraway Kagoshima to join the Tokyo police force. His closest friend is Nihei, a farmer's son from Tohoku who becomes the steadying influence on headstrong Henmi.

Japanese drama

The beauty of the Japanese family system is portrayed through the women who greet a woman who went to America thirty years ago to visit her grave.

Reiko Nishida, though she had both parents, felt lonely because she couldn’t fit in with the cold atmosphere at home. A student at Wakaba Academy in Osaka, she eventually succumbed to the allure of a superficial lifestyle and joined a group of delinquents, but Kimiko Kimizuka, a student council member, tried desperately to save her friend from the path of crime.

Like many women after the war, Toshiko works as a chorus girl; her boyfriend Tadashi wishes she'd join him more frequently, but she detests his criminal involvement.

1958 Japanese movie

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Shinpachi Morimura, who was born in a fusuma craftsman's house, wants to join the Japanese navy. However, his father wants him to continue in the family business and refuses to accept it.

Japanese propaganda film about the Normanton Incident.

A young woman is attacked by a serial rapist and murderer whom her detective father is investigating. Though she survives, the impact of the event creates increasing discord and agony for her and her loved ones.

Japanese war movie.

The movie follows a young woman (Kinuyo Tanaka), a daughter of a high-ranking businessman and his neglected mistress, as she struggles to ease her mother's loneliness, while also having an affair with her father's subordinate.

A melodrama set in Kuroshima.

1939 Japanese movie

Adaptation of a famous Kyouka Izumi novel. Set in the early 1900's, it tells the story of the impossible love between a young scholar a beautiful geisha.

The head of Oshu, Harumichi Honma, was ordered by the boat bugyo (Commissioner of the board) Tajima Kuze to extract five gold coins to the Shogun family in Edo, and put it into Ryujin Maru. However, Tajima, who was the chief retainer of the shogunate, said that he was a member of the board, tetsugoro Funabashi, kumiyumi no Kami ichibei, and his son, masakichi, and others, and in the middle of the night, he killed all the members with poison in the night of the storm, threw Masayoshi, who was a fellow of the city, and masakichi, who escaped from the death of poison, into the sea and sank the boat to eliminate evidence.

Yuki is a young, single mother supporting herself and her son, Haru, with a job as a bar hostess.

Jie attended a women's university with the financial support of her geisha sister Oha and became a lawyer. The aim. Michiko, one of the seven best friends from the same women's college, is getting married. The man she's marrying is her sister's lover.

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This happened at a post station on the Shinshu road. Takizo Hoshigoe, a wanted man who has been missing since breaking through the Oto checkpoint, came to this post station longing for his hometown and stayed at Shinanoya. A farmer named Sakubei, who was struggling to pay his taxes, came to sell his daughter Omitsu.

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Kinuyo is a daughter of rice cracker shop in downtown. She fell in love with her sister's boyfriend. It is a story whose theme is warm human relationships in a town of customs and manners.

A family story in the year of 1943 during the war. The director is Shunkai Mizuho, who worked on "Hibari no Circus Sad Kobato" starring Hibari Misora after the war. Previously, there is only a 6-minute short version in the National Film Archive, therefore, the full version is this movie is very valuable. This is considered a masterpiece that depicts a happy family of 7 (a father, a mother, 3 sons and 2 daughters).They care about each other, and also trust each other. Father started to ask all the children "what do you want to be in the future?" since an early age. Boys said they want to go to college, they want to be painters, and when it comes to the girls, although they wanted to be generals, their answer was "become a bride, a wife, and a good mother." Brothers and sisters get along well and occasionally fight, but they all discuss the cause, and would apologize to each other. The story was so gentle that it is hard to believe it was during the war.

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Group of women escape Chinese controlled area for Japanese occupied lands during Pacific War.

When a young woman named Kanako goes to Lake Yamanaka with her close friends, she meets a young businessman, Saeki, who gives her an expensive pearl necklace to win her favor. As Kanako sets out to return the gift, she meets her father, who steals the necklace in order to repay his creditor.

During college military training exercises, the bond between two friends and athletic rivals is tested when one of them becomes involved with a woman who may be a prostitute.

Contrast between two outlooks on life: one of a poor factory worker and the other the heir to millions.

In this comic sequel to Yoshimura Kozaburo's original, Minami no Kaze, ex-baron (Saburi Shin) is in Singapore where he meets an old friend who proposes a scam to make some quick cash. It involved inventing the story that Saigo Takamori didn't actually die in the Satsuma Rebellion but escaped to Southeast Asia to start a new religion and in the process fathered a son who is now the founder. But when they bring the supposed heir and his aide to Japan, chaos ensues...

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Based on the original work by Fumiko Hayashi, this is a story about a woman and two men. The lust is restrained and indifferent. The story even has an elegance to it, which is the charm of the 30 year old Kinuyo Tanaka. There was a time when Tanaka was adorable... Shin Saburi was young and Chishu Ryu was young too. It is a promise of melodrama that the rival or friend is prettier than the heroine Kinyo.

Hana wa itsuwarazu (1941) is the second directorial work by Shochiku's Oba Hideo. Oba had previously worked as an assistant director to Shimizu Hiroshi and penned films for Shimazu Yasujiro. In this early effort, he is not stylistically very far from either, but then again all Shochiku directors resemble each other to a point. The film is an everyday romance for younger audiences, full of clean, ideal human beings.

1949 drama film

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Reiko Minagawa leaves her home in Okayama to avoid an arranged marriage she doesn't want. Upon arriving in Tokyo, she calls Akira Isomura, a college student for whom she has feelings. Isomura is pleasantly surprised by her call, and promises to meet her at the train station entrance in about ten minutes. However, unaware that there are two entrances, the two of them spend hours waiting at different gates and are ultimately unable to meet.

Ainu chieftain Otena Kamui dies leaving a secret to his son. Years later, the grown son and his child are drawn into the hunt for the “Tower of Otena” treasure while a corrupt magistrate’s family fractures around them.

A hostile Chinese nurse (Yamaguchi) who works in an orphanage is won over by the care and commitment of the Japanese doctor (Sano) who treats her wards. Disease outbreaks and family obligations, however, threaten to torpedo their budding romance.

Amusing masterpiece from director Yoshimura Kazusabu divided in two parts taken from the newspaper serial novel of Shishiko Shishi. Like in "Warm Current", Shin Saburi, Mieko Takamine and Mitsuko Mito are appearing, but this is a fresh comedy very unusual for wartime.

A timely masterpiece that boldly reveals women's secrets on the issue of when abortion is acceptable...

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As the map fragments are united, conspiracies tighten around the magistrate’s clan. Storms, uprisings and betrayals lead the young hero to the secret of the “Tower of Otena” and a final reckoning.

A Japanese wartime film directed by Yasushi Sasaki.

A film by Tomotaka Tasaka.

Film directed by Keigo Kimura.

The first film in the Daiei series. At the command of Lord Aiba, Tange Sazen targets two famous swords owned by Onozuka Tessai.

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A boy aviator endures rigorous training and a sad fate, and grows into a strong man with his eyes set on becoming an eagle.

O-Kiyo (Mitsuko Mito), who had escaped from her boss, Shoden, who controlled the Sensoji Temple district, was desperately contemplating suicide when she was rescued by ronin Kojuro Tozawa (Kazuo Hasegawa), who hid her in a dilapidated apartment building. The Shoden clan desperately searched for O-Kiyo, but Kojuro found a huge sum of 50 ryo and ransomed O-Kiyo. Unable to accept this outcome, the enraged Shoden clan attempted to win the favor of constable Jinnosuke Nakayama (Kusuo Abe), seeking to demolish the dilapidated building and transform the area into a pleasure district. However, Kojuro thwarted their plans, bringing joy to the poor residents of the building. After demonstrating his remarkable skills, Kojiro revealed his true identity - he was a prominent hatamoto.

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