Taiga Nakano

In 1963, as Japan emerged from the shadows of war into an era of extraordinary transformation, an unlikely song made music history. "Ue o Muite Arukou," known internationally as "Sukiyaki," became the first Japanese song to top the U.S. Billboard charts, remaining at No. 1 for three weeks and captivating listeners around the world.

In April 1941, months before the Pacific War begins, Japan’s brightest young elites, bureaucrats, military officers, and civilians, are secretly assembled at the Total War Research Institute. Tasked with simulating a conflict against the United States, they confront harsh realities through intense analysis.

There are saints living in Tokyo, Japan: Buddha the Enlightened One, and Jesus, Son of God. After successfully bringing the previous century to a close, the two share an apartment in Tachikawa while enjoying some well-earned time off down on Earth. Buddha pinches pennies like a typical neighborhood housewife, while Jesus is prone to making impulse buys.

In the middle of a riverside park stands a single bench. One evening, a couple of childhood friends who hadn’t seen each other in a while meet up at this bench. Although awkward at times, they sit there exchanging gentle words of affection.

Why had a mother who seemed happy desired to end her own life? Desperate to uncover his mother’s true intentions, Sakuya ventures into uncharted technological territory. He turns to VF (Virtual Figure), a technology that aggregates personal data from one’s life to create a “human” in a virtual space.

When the brutal Boshin War breaks out in Japan, a group of inmates on death row unite to defend a fortress against the Imperial army.

Shun Fujishiro is a psychiatrist and works at a university hospital in Tokyo. He is engaged to Yayoi Sakamoto. One day in April, when he is about to marry Yayoi Sakamoto, he receives a letter from his first love Haru Iyoda. They dated 10 years ago. Suddenly, his fiancé Yayoi Sakamoto disappears.

Sanae, who went to prison after failing to kill her ex-boyfriend six years ago, meets Kenta, a forest ranger, and gets married. Sanae and Kenta's married life takes a new turn when the wife of Sanae's ex-boyfriend appears. Sanae still can't forget her ex-boyfriend, and Kenta is having a hard time dealing with her.

Tsuchiya, who lives with his single mother in Osaka, does not get serious work once he graduates from high school, but rather devotes himself to mailing jokes to the “Ohgiri” variety show. Seeking to be recognized as a show “Legend,” he devotes his entire life to laughter, setting himself the task of submitting hundreds of entries per day. At loose ends, he encounters a drifter, Pink, who finds him work at his bar while Tsuchiya now devotes himself to becoming a “postcard craftsman” who submits material to a radio program. The entertainers on the program begin to use material from his postcards. A comedian Tsuchiya admires, one of a comic duo called “Bacon,” says on the air that he admires Tsuchiya’s material and that he wants “to do material together.” Dreaming of another chance, Tsuchiya heads for Tokyo.

26 years old Hanako is on the verge of directing her first-ever feature film, achieving her childhood dream. Although she’s being hindered by an older male assistant director, she has a fateful encounter with a man named Masao, and her life at last begins to take on a whole new luster. However, the underhanded actions of an unscrupulous producer cause Hanako to have her personal project stolen. After being dumped into despair, she quietly stokes her rage, and makes a pledge to keep fighting, and never back down! Entangling Masao, her hopeless father and two older brothers (who she’s been out of touch with for over 10 years) in her obsessive quest, Hanako audaciously attempts to make her dream come true, her way!

Three men, born in 1987, are from the yutori ("relaxed") generation, and they continue their attempts at finding love, friendship, and success. Masakazu Sakama stopped working for a large company and took over his family business, but it's not doing well. Kazutoyo Yamaji is a sweet and sincere man. He works as an elementary school teacher, but he doesn't have experience in romantic relationships. For 11 years, Maribu Michigami took the college entrance exam for the university he wanted to attend. He finally made it and attended the school. After graduation, his launched his own business in China, but that failed. He now supports himself working part-time jobs.

Post-war Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. Adults who are swayed by the US military stationed in the country and swayed by US intentions cannot afford to care about children who should be protected. The war orphans, who had no choice but to survive on their own, were used to shining shoes for American soldiers, picking up cigarettes, and sometimes committing crimes. However, at some point, they came across a "cleaning" job. They work hard instead of committing crimes and earn money by being appreciated by people. The orphans begin to regain their smiles through experiences that make them feel like they should be alive. The children started to have a modest dream of "renting a house and living" with their own earnings, but they were attacked by an even harsher reality...

Akira works as a lawyer. One day, he meets with his former client Rie, who asks Akira to perform a background check on her late husband Daisuke.

Yuta lives in an orphanage while waiting for her mother to pick her up. One day, Yuta, who happened to know his mother's whereabouts, escaped from the facility with all his heart. However, there was a mother who depended on her cohabiting man and lived a self-deprecating life. Despaired, Yuta meets Sakamoto, a homeless man who lives in a light tiger while walking along the beach. Sakamoto accepts Yuta without asking anything. The two sleep and eat together while earning a small amount of money. Eventually, he became acquainted with Shiori, a girl who grew up in a wealthy family but had no place to live at home or school. Yuta is attracted to Shiori, who has the same loneliness as himself but is kind to him. However, the calm days end with an incident.

Japan, 1944. Trained for intelligence work, Hiroo Onoda, 22 years old, discovers a philosophy contrary to the official line: no suicide; stay alive whatever happens; the mission is more important than anything else. Sent to Lubang, a small island in the Philippines where the Americans are about to land, this role will be to wage a guerrilla war until the return of the Japanese troops. The Empire will surrender soon after; Onoda, 10,000 days later.

The novelist Shiga Naoya lives with his wife Haruko and their 4-year-old daughter Saeko. He is paranoid about Saeko’s health, making her wear heavy clothes even in summer in order to prevent her from catching a cold. Their child before Saeko died due to an epidemic, and he believes thorough enforcement is a natural consequence. In 1918, the Spanish flu reaches Japan. As the number of infected people grows, Shiga starts to suspect their servant Ishi might have gone to watch a travelling entertainment troupe’s performance which drew a great number of villagers. It is something Ishi is likely to do. But when Shiga questions her, she says that she did not go. However, she makes him have misgivings on a regular basis and he decides to take this opportunity to make her quit. An uproar ensues. Shiga feels that he has become a tyrant and refrains from kicking her out but he loses all reason and faith in humanity amid the pandemic…

Having failed to get into graduate school, with no girlfriend, no money, and no prospects of success with his band, Tsurugi's life has reached rock bottom. One day, after watching the video of Aya Matsuura's song “Momoiro Kataomoi”, he becomes obsessed with the idol singers of “Hello! Project”, and plunges into the idol geek lifestyle. However, as time passes, he and his buddies all find other things just as important as the idols and begin to move on.

Mikami, an ex-yakuza of middle age with most of his life in prison, gets released after serving 13 years of sentence for murder. Hoping to find his long lost mother, from whom he was separated as a child, he applies for a TV show and meets a young TV director Tsunoda. Meanwhile, he struggles to get a proper job and fit into society. His impulsive, adamant nature and ingrained beliefs cause friction in his relationship with Tsunoda and those who want to help him.

A man has a baby, runs away, then comes back, but he can't just show up, apologize, and hope that makes himself a grown man.

Atsuhisa lives with wife Natsumi and daughter Suzu. He and friend Takeda study languages to become businessmen. When Natsumi reveals an affair and wants divorce, their lives change.

Kato, a scriptwriter, is in love with Miho—but he can never manage to muster up enough courage to make the relationship anything more than a platonic friendship. Seemingly oblivious to Kato's feelings for her, Miho is always calling him up and spilling her guts about her own love problems. She's in love with someone else, it turns out, but Kato swallows his pride—hearing about it all is almost too much to bear, but he wants to be with Miho as much as he can.

The school’s handball club is about to close down. Can social media bring it back to life? Masao Kiyota is a high school student living in Japan’s southern Kumamoto Prefecture. Lacking passion for anything in life, he spends his days like so many youth on his smartphone along with his childhood friend, Okamoto. One day, they upload a photo taken three years previously when they were both part of their school’s handball team. To their surprise, the post goes a little viral. Encouraged, they add the hashtag: “#Handball Full Power” and are swarmed with “likes” from around the country. Amidst the sudden social media attention, Masao and Okamoto set to resuscitating a nearly defunct men’s handball team.

Three years after the event of the series, Takashi Mitsuhashi and Shinji Ito face the new enemies.

Taking place after the events of the TV series, Mitsuhashi and Ito face the new enemies.

Shuhei is leading a tough life. His alcoholic mother Akiko can only hook up with bad guys and order Shuhei to go get money from his disapproving grandparents instead of going to school. Except raising the little half-sister, his rock-bottom life seems to have no end.

A young bioarchaeologist Yukisuke is attracted to a girl Koyomi, who runs a small stand of taiyaki pastry that he often buys. Koyomi is hospitalized, however, by a car accident on a rainy day after they go out together, and wakes up with short term memory loss, where she cannot remember anything beyond the present day. Yukisuke tries to live close to her as before but the lack of collective memory starts to stagger him.

Tarō is a vagabond, a wannabe, an urchin, and not what anyone would call mainstream. He does not care. Do not even ask him about his background or age. He would not know and he would not bother. The man meets two others and he begins to experience a new set of conditions.

High school boy Machida is a loner who is not particularly good at his studies or extracurricular activities. He does seem to have his heart in the right place however. When he is injured at school instead of the school nurse at the infirmary a school-mate tends to him. He develops a crush for her and soon enough the feelings are returned.

Takako Kojima works as an announcer in Tokyo, Japan. She is tired of living in Tokyo and she doesn't see a bright future for herself. One day, she is assigned to cover a festival in Minamiosumi, Kagoshima Prefecture. Takako spent her childhood in the town of Minamiosumi and this will be her first time going there in many years. Takako reluctantly covers the festival, but she is changed by the people there.

To protect his family from a mysterious being, a man joins forces with a journalist and an exorcist - but they come to learn what they are dealing with is beyond their imagination.

Taiji has been estranged from his mother Mitsuko for years. Due to a meeting with his friend, he looks back at his past with his mother. After not seeing her for years, Taiji sees Mitsuko again. He tries to regain his mother's love.

When members of a student club gather at a karaoke box, events don’t unfold in predictable ways, leading to a uniquely absurd ending when dawn breaks.

Five short stories from five different directors set ten years in Japan's future.

The Akazas are a blue-collar family living in a working-class neighborhood of Tokyo. Older brother Inosuke is a carpenter who works for his father Shinobu's construction business. Younger sister Momoko is a truckdriver. Passions run high in the Akaza household and the two siblings are constantly bickering. One day, Momoko reveals she had a miscarriage but refuses to say who the father is.

Daisuke Yuge works as a tour guide in Oahu, Hawaii and also studies astronomy. He meets Rui Fujishima at a cafe and falls in love with her at first sight, but Rui Fujishima suffers from memory loss due to a past accident.

A man is found washed up on a beach in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, suffering from amnesia and speaking in broken Indonesian and Japanese.

A struggling, unemployed musician living with his girlfriend looks to improve his life after he discovers how she's been paying the rent.

Three friends who will soon graduate from high school decide to take one last trip together.

While a gang of high school girls randomly beats lone men at night, the photo of a young woman who has been declared missing is used to design a template which is painted on each wall of a small suburban town.

A classmate from Ushijima's middle school days, Takemoto, shows up. He was a kind man, but now is jobless and without a home. Adrift and unable to borrow money from Ushijima, Takemoto heads for Seiai Home where he can stay while doing work.

Toshio hires Yasaka to work in his workshop. But then this old acquaintance, who has just been released from prison, begins to meddle in Toshio's family life.

A man drop-kicks a rude convenience store customer and wins the heart of his coworker, so he keeps kicking impolite customers.

Ren struggles with the death of his longtime friend Kaoru. He finds a painting of a girl that Kaoru left behind. Ren sets out on a journey to find the girl.

The master of a dorayaki pastry store hires a 76-year-old woman whose talents attract customers from all over. But she's hiding a troubling secret. Life's joys are found in the little details, and no matter what may be weighing you down, everyone loves a good pastry.

Mie’s father died during the aftermath of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. One day, she finds a bundle of unsent New Year’s cards, which languished there for 28 years. To find out why the cards were never sent, Mie tracks down Haruhiko Sakacho. Haruhiko played on the same high school baseball team with her father. Mie eventually gathers together her father's former teammates to play in the Masters Koshien (a senior league baseball tournament). Mie also uncovers a truth about her father and the baseball team.

A teacher is sexually involved with an underage student. She visits her father's home and discovers a boy who's been kept as a sex slave. The teacher continues harboring the boy out of fear and begins to feel sexually attracted to him.

Based on the writings of a true life, vision-impaired lawyer comes a story about a blind man who manages to pass the extremely difficult bar exam and earn his lawyer’s license. Long desiring to help the weak, Kensuke Okochi gets a job at an attorney’s office while he and his wife, also blind, look forward to their first child. When a plaintiff in a divorce case decides to withdraw from litigation, Kensuke worries at first that it has to do with his own perceived inadequacies as a lawyer, but a few days later, he is visited by the female plaintiff, Satomi, showing injuries to her body. While it appears an open and shut case of domestic violence with an audio recording as proof, Kensuke detects a “certain scent” coming from the plaintiff which gives him pause as to her real intentions.

Kyoto in April. A timid and shy student, Watabe, is struggling to make friends and spending lonely days in a university. Concurrently, student life for Satomi Kumahori has also been hard, due to her overweight appearance. For Satomi, it is only Watabe who talks to her kindly and does not make fun of her. One day she takes advantage of Watabe and starts to live off him, literally like a parasite. While Satomi is using him as a slave, he falls in love with Nako, a girl he meets at work. At the same time, he accidentally learns about Satomi's past.

As a young child, Hana loses her family to a devastating tsunami that wipes out her town. At a shelter, distant relative Jungo sees her wandering and adopts her as his daughter.

Two swim-team members, a hairless boy and a hirsute girl, discover the pangs and tangles of first love.

A somber paranormal thriller that offers an original, exciting variation of the tale of two men with supernatural abilities, locked in a duel to the death. A battle between a man who can control people with a stare, and the only man he cannot control. When their fate cross, the survival battle begins. The two men with inevitable fate, who will survive?

After failing her university entrance exam, Sakuko is invited by her aunt Mikie to spend summer vacation in a beautiful seaside town. Sakuko gets to know the people of the town, including Takashi, a shy relative of her childhood friend.

Airi is a high school student. On the way home from school, Airi is kidnapped by someone. Then, 9 more high school students are all kidnapped like Airi. Those kidnapped students are forced to participate in Jinroh Game, with their lives at stake.

At an all boys high school, Tadakuni, Yoshitake and Hidenori are close friends and think usually all day about girls. Their high school then co-hosts a school festival with an all girls high school.

Kazuomi Nara lost his job due to the bankruptcy of his company and Shiori, his fiancé, is pregnant. Running away from reality, he steals a car and ends up in a field with four strangers, Joe, Marco, Santa and Tokie. An old man who can't ride a bike, a con artist, a virgin and a shop keeper. As confused as he is, Kazuomi decides to stay with these four strangers.

A story about the disappearance of Kirishima, a star athlete of the volleyball club, and how his disappearance affects every person in school.

Kyohei Nagashima (Masaki Okada) has shut away the world. During his high school days he was the target of bullying and experienced horrifying moments. Now as a young adult Kyohei takes a new job. He works for a company that specializes in cleaning out the homes of recently deceased individuals. With his new job Kyohei meets co-worker Yuki (Nana Eikura). Yuki has also experienced a traumatizing event as a teen and has also shut herself away from the world. These two young people form a bond as they go through the homes of the recently departed people. They gradually open up to each other and in the process to the world. Yet, their fragile psyches may or may not be ready for such changes ...

A film about an orphan kid in Japan in 1943

Momose (played by Sousuke Takaoka), who used to be a street punk, lives with girlfriend Kayo (played by Tomoko Tabata). Trouble brews for the couple when Kayo's younger sister Momo (played by Erena Ono) moves into their home for the summer. Momose finds himself gradually being drawn to the free spirited ways of Momo. A new love comedy from Keisuke Yoshida director of "Cafe Isobe".

Dr Toma, a skilled surgeon, starts work at a regional hospital in Japan. After performing an operation to remove a patient’s liver cancer, something that normally would not be done at this hospital, he quickly gains a very good reputation amongst the town’s people. Some of his colleagues become so jealous they are resentful and waiting patiently for the perfect opportunity to crucify him. Soon they get their chance as Dr Toma considers performing a controversial operation…

One year ago, Rui (Rio Yamashita) lost her eyesight after a hit & run accident. She's still traumatized by the accident and has yet to undergo rehab treatment. She then meets a young man named Wataru (Kento Hayashi) who is fascinated by paragliding. Rui slowly comes out her shell and finds a way to rise up again with the help of Wataru. Unfortunately, reality can sometimes be cruel. Can Rui and Wataru face each other again after facing this cruel truth?

The story of a Japanese sub's last mission during WWII.

ER doctor Tsuyoshi Matsuoka receives a patient with a virus unlike anything he's seen before. His symptoms include high fever, convulsions, vomiting of blood and multiple organ failure. Could this be a new form of influenza or is it some other variety of virus? As the situation worsens and more cases begin arriving, a medical officer from the World Health Organization named Eiko Kobayashi is dispatched to the area. At the rate the virus is spreading, the entire city’s transportation system and infrastructure would be brought to a halt within 3 months. Within 6 months it could spread to tens of millions of people--reaching a death toll far worse than any war.

Suzuki Sora is a cheerful country girl from the small town of Bie. She made a promise to her father, and following this promise applies and is accepted for a magic intership in Tokyo, where she will face the life in a big city. While training to get better with her magic, she meets a mysterious boy also practicing to become a mage. While he can not use magic that well and he seems distant and cold at first, Sora’s fate intertwines with his and the two are thrown together, learning a lot of new things about life and each other.

Higashigaoka Junior High School is in turmoil as one of the pupils, Noguchi, who had been bullied, attempted suicide last term. On the first day of the new term, a substitute teacher arrives to take the second year class. When the teacher, Murauchi (Hiroshi Abe), introduces himself, the pupils are surprised by his stutter. He has a speech impediment. Unable to speak eloquently, Murauchi faces his pupils with ‘words of truth’. His first instruction to the pupils is to return Noguchi’s desk and chair to the original place in the classroom. Every morning Murauchi greets the empty desk, “Good morning, Noguchi.” This causes a ripple beyond the classroom and among other teachers and parents, but Murauchi will not stop doing it. Eventually the day comes when Murauchi must leave.

Set in Nasu, Tochigi Prefecture in 1954, movie tells the tale of 14 year old boys: their friendships, fights among friends, and rebellions against the school. It also tells the story of the adults who live around the boys. This is a nostalgic, bitter, and sentimental journey into lives in the post-war environment.

In the near future of a Japan, the ancient 'Act of Vengeance' is revived and professional executioners are permitted to kill criminals by the requests from their victims. People who are to be executed are notified of the execution time and date in advance and they are allowed to have their own guard.