Best Japanese movies

The problematic lives of teenager students for whom the singer Lily Chou-Chou's dreamy music is the only way to escape an alienating, violent and insensitive society.

Five bizarre stories with no apparent connection to one and other eventually become intertwined, resulting in surreal circumstances.

As the feudal Japan era draws to a close, a widower samurai experiences difficulty balancing clan loyalties, 2 young daughters, an aged mother, and the sudden reappearance of his childhood sweetheart.

Yuko, a teacher of middle-school, is shattered to see her four-year-old daughter dead. She returns back to the school and finds out that her students are responsible for her daughter's murder.

During a downpour, a generous ronin and his supporting wife are stranded at a country inn. The ronin comes to the attention of a lord who wants to hire him as an instructor for his men, who treat the ronin with disrespect.

The story of a village woman given the grueling task of looking after (and fulfilling the sexual needs of) her quadruple amputee husband, a Japanese soldier in the Second Sino-Japanese War who has been decreed a "War God" by the Emperor.

Soon after buying an expensive cello, Daigo learns that his orchestra is disbanding. He moves back to his hometown with his wife, where he answers an ad for what Daigo thinks is a travel agency but is, in actuality, a mortuary.

Amateur photographer Makoto and the homely but endearing Shizuru meet during their university entrance ceremony and become instant friends. Shy by nature, Makoto finds himself opening up around Shizuru, who is secretly in love with him.

A lonely university student develops a romance with a beautiful interesting woman, who turns out to be a cyborg from the future.

A young woman returns from the dead to her guilt-ridden husband and son, but she cannot remember them.

In a small Tokyo apartment, twelve-year-old Akira must care for his younger siblings after their mother leaves them and shows no sign of returning.

During her family's move to the suburbs, a sullen 10-year-old girl wanders into a world ruled by gods, witches and spirits, and where humans are changed into beasts.

A young boy and his little sister struggle to survive in Japan during World War II.

When Matsuko is murdered, her nephew, Sho, gets to progressively unveil the many details of her mysterious past, discovering she wasn't just a forgotten outcast and had led an intriguing yet bizarre life.

A young man is falsely accused of molesting a high-school girl on a train. He is arrested and charged, and goes through endless court sessions, all the while insisting that he is innocent.

A group of assassins come together for a suicide mission to kill an evil lord.

As sadomasochistic yakuza enforcer Kakihara searches for his missing boss he comes across Ichi, a repressed and psychotic killer who may be able to inflict levels of pain that Kakihara has only dreamed of achieving.

In 1923, the Korean teenager Kim Shun-Pei moves from Cheju Island, in South Korea, to Osaka, in Japan. Along the years, he becomes a cruel, greedy and violent man and builds a factory of kamaboko, processed seafood products, in his poor Korean-Japanese community exploiting his employees. He makes fortune, abuses and destroys the lives of his wife and family, having many mistresses and children and showing no respect to anybody. Later he closes the factory, lending the money with high interests and becoming a loan shark. His hatred behavior remains until his last breath, alone in North Korea.

Toward the end of World War II, middle-aged soldier Keita is entrusted with a postcard from a comrade who is sure he will die in battle. After the war ends, Keita visits his comrade's wife Yuko and bears witness to the tragic life she has led. This year's Oscar entry from Japan finds SHINDO in top form and his 49th and reportedly last film as fresh and poignant as ever.

A woman with an abusive childhood travels back to taiwan from japan with her daughter in order to find her father's missing ashes, confronting her past along the way, discovering many secrets that were hidden from her throughout her life.

Young women in a small Japanese town look to revive their home's declining fortunes by building a Hawaiian village tourist attraction.

Four down on their luck housewives murder their husbands and find whacky ways to hide the bodies!

Sugihara, born in Japan but with North Korean parents, falls in love with a Japanese girl after changing from a North Korean school to a Japanese school. His boxer dad teaches him boxing - skills used a lot.

A family struggling to live together even with the outrageous behaviors from each family members.

A yakuza enforcer is ordered to secretly drive his beloved colleague to be assassinated. But when the colleague unceremoniously disappears en route, the trip that follows is a twisted, surreal and horrifying experience.