Movies: Akitake Kōno

The story of Sanshiro, a strong stubborn youth, who travels into the city in order to learn Jujutsu. However, upon his arrival he discovers a new form of self-defence: Judo. The main character is based on Shiro Saigo, a legendary judoka....

Over more than a decade, the daughter of a Kyoto Imperial University professor comes of age as she witnesses her father fired for opposing the rise of fascism in Japan and becomes involved with two of his students....

In medieval Japan, a woman and her children journey to find the family's patriarch, who was exiled years before....

Yoshitsune Minamoto, disguised with his retinue as monks, must make do with a comical porter as their guide through hostile territory en route to safety....

After handing in a report on the treatment of Chinese colonial labor, Kaji is offered the post of labor chief at a large mining operation in Manchuria, which also grants him exemption from military service. He accepts, and moves to Manchuria with his...

Saheji, a man-about-town, gets stuck at a high-class brothel when he can’t pay the bill. He makes the best of his situation by performing various tasks amidst the tumult of the end of the shogunate—but always by making sure to get a “commission” for ...

From runaway brides to a typhoon, the continued adventures of Ushikata police station....

The stories of several young women who work in a 'precision optical instruments' factory during the second World War. Despite illness, injury, and tremendous personal hardship, the women persevere in their tasks, devoted to their work and their count...

In this government-suggested sequel, Sugata again grows as a judo master, and demonstrates his (and by extension, all Japanese) superiority to the foreign warrior....

Three bank robbers, Eijima, Nojiri, and Takasugi, flee the police and escape into the mountains. At an inn high in the Japanese Alps, Eijima and Nojiri encounter a young woman and her father, as well as Honda, a mountaineer. The inn folk do not reali...

A young girl named Oichi is abandoned by her mother and blinded by a lightning strike. When her guardian is killed, she learns to wield a sword from a traveling ronin. As she develops into a master swordsman, her profession becomes that of a bounty...

A drama about relations between Japanese immigrants and the indigenous Ainu on Hokkaido, the most northerly island of Japan. From a novel by Taijun Takeda....

Kokubu, captain of his university's kendo team, is a mystery to those who know him: An ascetic dedicated to a point of obsession with the simplicity and beauty of the sword arts. Kagawa, a promising but arrogant kendo student, is attracted to Kokubu'...

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Special Forces commander Captain Tadamori returns to Kyoto after successfully defeating the uprising of pirates in the western sea of Japan. But because the high courtiers dislike career soldiers gaining power and influence, they ignore the will of e...

Saburo and Keiko fall in love with each other but the tide of war separates them....

A group of Okinawan high school girls are drafted as nurses during the American invasion of the island. As the enemy army advances further, the situation for the girls becomes increasingly desperate as food and shelter run out and the number of injur...

Hibari Misora plays a singing guide, who is secretly in love, her fortunes turn for the worse when a gangster’s henchman hears her singing and takes a liking to her beautiful voice. The trouble starts when her family borrows money from the gangsters,...

A yakuza boss and his right-hand, Hawasaki, escape from prison. the film concentrates on their relationship, emphasizing loyalty and thier eventual betrayal, enroute they get involved in money trafficking, a cop killing and horse racing scams before...

Famous for his coin tossing when capturing criminals, an Edo detective, Heiji, launches an investigation into the mysterious murder of his friend Seigoro....