Ishun is a wealthy, but unsympathetic, master printer who has wrongly accused his wife and best employee of being lovers. To escape punishment, the accused run away together, but Ishun is certain to be ruined if word gets out.
Recommended by Jacques Doillon, Christian Rouaud, Elia Suleiman, Ryūsuke Hamaguchi
A woman's struggle for equality in Japan in the 1880s. 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. Eiko and Omoi are jailed because of a fire at a factory instigated by Chiyo, a servant girl from Eiko's home in Okayama, who was sold to slavery. A few years later the 1889 constitution is proclaimed, Eiko, Omoi, and Chiyo are pardoned, and the Liberal Party is reinaugurated. However Omoi does not campaign for women's rights.
Recommended by Pedro Costa
Follows a woman's fight and survival amid the vicissitudes of life and the cruelty of the society.
Recommended by Akira Kurosawa, Luc Dardenne, Aki Kaurismäki, Thomas Arslan, Elia Suleiman, Lucile Hadzihalilovic
In medieval Japan, a compassionate governor is sent into exile. His wife and children try to join him, but are separated, and the children grow up amid suffering and oppression.
Recommended by Martin Scorsese, Jacques Doillon, Arnaud Desplechin, Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne, Robin Campillo, Paul Vecchiali
The adopted son of a legendary actor, and an aspiring star himself, turns to his infant brother's wet nurse for support and affection - only for her to give up everything for her beloved's glory.
Recommended by Luc Moullet
The personal tales of various prostitutes who occupy a brothel.
Recommended by Bertrand Bonello, Costa Gavras, Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne, Catherine Corsini, Paul Vecchiali, Sean Baker
A tale of ambition, family, love, and war set in the midst of the Japanese Civil Wars of the sixteenth century.
Recommended by Martin Scorsese, Jacques Doillon, Arnaud Desplechin, James Gray, Patricia Mazuy, Luc Moullet, Bertrand Tavernier, Alain Guiraudie, José Luis Guerín, Miguel Gomes, Atom Egoyan, Jessica Hausner, Damien Chazelle, Dominique and Fiona Abel & Gordon, Nicole Garcia, Elia Suleiman, Diane Kurys
A mistress of a drug dealer in post-war Japan is shocked when she discovers that he is having an affair with her sister.
Recommended by João Pedro Rodrigues