Younger Brother / Otôto (1960)
Drama
Set in 1926 when Japanese tradition was much stronger, this standard drama looks at the inner workings of a small family, especially the relationship between a sister and brother.
Starring: Keiko Kishi, Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Kinuyo Tanaka, Masayuki Mori
Director: Kon Ichikawa
Lullaby of the Earth / Daichi no komoriuta (1976)
Drama
The story of Rin, a blind orphan girl, brought up in the rustic mountains of Shikoku by her grandmother. When her grandmother dies, she is sold into prostitution. What follows is a depiction of her cruel descent into the depths of moral decay in a system of exploitation, unbridled lust, vanity, and greed.
Starring: Mieko Harada, Natsuko Kahara, Meiko Kaji, Mihoko Nakagawa, Eiji Okada, Yûsuke Satô, Kinuyo Tanaka, Kôji Uruki
Director: Yasuzô Masumura
Equinox Flower / Higanbana (1958)
Comedy | Drama
Wataru Hirayama is an old-fashioned father, whose outwardly liberal views on marriage are severely tested when his daughter tells him she wants a love-match.
Starring: Chishû Ryû, Kinuyo Tanaka, Ineko Arima, Yoshiko Kuga, Keiji Sada
Director: Yasujirô Ozu
Uwasa no onna / The Woman in the Rumor (1954)
Drama | Romance
Hatsuko Umabuchi is a widow who runs a prosperous geisha house in present day Kyoto. Her daughter Yukiko returns from Tokyo following a failed suicide attempt, after her lover found out about her mother's profession. Hatsuko is having a discrete affair with the young Dr. Matoba, who looks after the geisha girls. The doctor is attracted to Yukiko, who initially despises him and everything connected with the geisha house. However Yukiko gradually changes her views.
Starring: Kinuyo Tanaka, Tomoemon Otani, Yoshiko Kuga, Eitarô Shindô
Director: Kenji Mizoguchi
A Legend or Was It? / Legend of a Duel to the Death / Shito no densetsu (1963)
Action | Drama
A young woman who has been evacuated to Hokkaido with her family during wartime receives a marriage proposal from the son of the village head, but declines on account of his barbarous acts during the war. She and her family are ousted from the village, but her suitor refuses to give up…
Starring: Shima Iwashita, Gô Katô, Mariko Kaga, Kinuyo Tanaka, Tsutomu Matsukawa, Bunta Sugawara, Yoshi Katô, Kikue Môri, Tatsuya Ishiguro
Director: Keisuke Kinoshita
The Life of Oharu / Saikaku ichidai onna (1952)
Drama
A fifty-year-old prostitute, no longer able to attract men, looks back on her sad life. Once a lady-in-waiting at the imperial court at Kyoto, Oharu fell in love with, and became the lover of, a man below her station. They were discovered, thus Oharu and her family were exiled. From there on, Oharu lived the rest of her life filled with sorrow and humiliation.
Starring: Toshirô Mifune, Kinuyo Tanaka, Tsukie Matsuura, Ichirô Sugai
Director: Kenji Mizoguchi
The Ballad of Narayama / Narayama bushiko (1958)
Drama
This haunting, kabuki-inflected version of a Japanese folk legend is set in a remote mountain village where food is scarce and tradition dictates that citizens who have reached their seventieth year must be carried to the summit of Mount Narayama and left there to die.
Starring: Kinuyo Tanaka, Teiji Takahashi, Yûko Mochizuki, Danko Ichikawa, Keiko Ogasawara
Director: Keisuke Kinoshita
Legend of Bailiff Sansho / Sansho the Bailiff / Sanshô dayû (1954)
Drama
When an idealistic governor disobeys the reigning feudal lord, he is cast into exile, his wife and children left to fend for themselves and eventually wrenched apart by vicious slave traders. Under Kenji Mizoguchi's dazzling direction, this classic Japanese story became one of cinema's greatest masterpieces, a monumental, empathetic expression of human resilience in the face of evil.
Starring: Kinuyo Tanaka, Kyôko Kagawa, Yoshiaki Hanayagi, Akitake Kôno, Masao Shimizu, Eitarô Shindô
Director: Kenji Mizoguchi
Ugetsu monogatari / Ugetsu (1953)
Drama | Thriller
In the beginning of the springtime in the period of the Japanese Civil Wars of the Sixteenth Century in Lake Biwa in the Province of Omi, the family man farmer and craftsman Genjurô travels to Nagahama to sell his wares and makes a small fortune. His neighbor Tobei that is a fool man dreams on becoming a samurai, but he can not afford to buy the necessary outfit. The greedy Genjurô and Tobei work together manufacturing clay potteries, expecting to sell the pieces and enrich; however, their wives Miyage and Ohama are worried about the army of the cruel Shibata that is coming to their village and they warn their ambitious husbands. Their village is looted but the families flee and survive; Genjurô and Tobei decide to travel by boat with their wives and baby to sell the wares in a bigger town. When they meet another boat that was attacked by pirates, Genjurô decides to leave his wife and son on the bank of the river…
Starring: Masayuki Mori, Machiko Kyô, Kinuyo Tanaka
Director: Kenji Mizoguchi
