Obscure Japanese Film #168 Hiroshi Kawaguchi and Yoko Katsuragi Katsuya ( Hiroshi Kawaguchi) is a cynical student who studies as little ...
Feb 21, 2025 • Subscribe
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A Story from Echigo / 越後つついし親不知 / Echigo Tsutsuishi Oyashirazu (1964)
Obscure Japanese Film #107 Rentaro Mikuni and Yoshiko Sakuma In 1930s Japan, Gonsuke (Rentaro Mikuni) is working at a sake brewery in Fushim...
Conflagration (1958) review
A narrative that serenely depicts the possible outcome of a subject’s failure to find, in a post-war landscape, someone to carry the Name-Of-The-Father.
Girl with the Fire Banner (唄祭りかんざし纏, Kinnosuke Fukada, 1958)
Hibari Misora puts out the fires of the Bakumatsu in another musical jidaigeki adventure.
Furin / 不倫 (1965)
Obscure Japanese Film #126 Ayako Wakao Saburi (Keizo Kawasaki) is a writer who has just won the Newcomer of the Year Award for…
Giants and Toys (1958) review
A classic that, as a critique of capitalism and materialism, has not lost any of its relevance.
The Precipice / 氷壁 / Hyoheki (1958)
Obscure Japanese Film #119 Kenji Sugawara When salaryman Uoza (Kenji Sugawara) returns from a mountaineering trip and encounters his frien...
The Best is Yet to Come (不止不休, Wang Jing, 2020)
A man denied a fair chance because of his impoverished background comes to identify with the plight of those carrying the hepatitis B virus in Wang Jing’s true…
Intimate Stranger (親密な他人, Mayu Nakamura, 2022)
A middle-aged woman bonds with a young man claiming to have information about her missing son in Mayu Nakamura’s noirish psychological drama.
お湯割り
In the newsletter this month I wrote about 角ハイ (kakuhai). This is a combination of 角瓶 (kakubin), Suntory’s flagship whiskey, and ハイボール (highball), a mixed drink made from…
Dear Tenant (親愛的房客, Cheng Yu-Chieh, 2020)
A grief-stricken man lovingly takes care of his late partner’s family but finds himself continually othered in Cheng’s melancholy familial drama
Crimson Wings (紅の翼, Ko Nakahira, 1958)
An earnest pilot’s mission to deliver the tetanus vaccine to a little boy is disrupted by a fugitive yakuza hitman in Ko Nakahira’s lighthearted thriller.
Equinox Flower (彼岸花, Yasujiro Ozu, 1958)
An ageing patriarch struggles to accept his declining authority in Ozu’s first colour film
THE LOYAL 47 RONIN (1958) – A Samurai Masterpiece
I’ve seen five Japanese films about the story of the 47 Ronin, made from 1941 to 1994. There were dozens more films about this famous incident from the…
入りませんか？ vs 入ります？ #learnjapanese
Learn Japanese with Me - https://bit.ly/4drmyU2
Flesh Pier (女体桟橋, Teruo Ishii, 1958)
An undercover cop’s mission to crack a trafficking is disrupted when he runs into an an old flame in Teruo Ishii’s early B-movie noir
Japanese Animation, 1937-1958: or, more notes on Akira Daikuhara
The origin and core of this piece is my personal interest in Daikuhara, but it will not be another biographical piece like my previous one. I will rather…
The Young Boss (花笠若衆, Kiyoshi Saeki, 1958)
Hibari Misora stars as a pair of twins separated at birth in Kiyoshi Saeki’s musical jidaigeki adventure
Wolves of the Night (夜の狼, Yoichi Ushihara, 1958)
A heartless yakuza becomes conflicted on being confronted with the consequences of his actions in Yoichi Ushihara’s slice of Nikkatsu Noir.
傘の下、ふたり
Author & Artist: ぢゅん子 (Junko)Released March 2012 by Kaiohsha’s Gush ComicsGenre: Drama, Romance
久しぶりだね
It’s been a while. A little under 2 years in fact. But that’s life, it has a tendency to keep moving forward. Even when you aren’t ready for…
Godspeed (人生路不熟, Yi Xiaoxing, 2023)
An earnest young man does everything he can to try and impress his traditionalist father-in-law-to-be but just can’t seem to catch break in Yi Xiaoxing’s charming road trip…
"How About Saying 入りましょう Instead of 入ります?" #learnjapanese
Learn Japanese with Me - https://bit.ly/4drmyU2
Endless Desire (果しなき欲望, Shohei Imamura, 1958)
A gang returning to dig up the stolen morphine they buried at the end of the war is slowly torn apart by their greed in Shomei Imamura’s darkly…
THE BLOB (1958): Criterion Blu-ray of a Sci-Fi Classic
When I was five, I remember standing outside my local movie theater, the Crotona, and seeing a poster for the movie, THE BLOB (1958), with this massive jello-like…
Forever, My Love / 佳人 / Kajin (‘Beautiful Woman’/ ‘Good Person’, 1958)
Obscure Japanese Film #252Ryoji Hayama 1943. Shigeru (Ryoji Hayama) is a student returning from Tokyo to his hometown of Toyooka in Hyogo Prefecture on western Honshu (then part of the San’in…
The Naked Sun / 裸の太陽 / Hadaka no taiyo (1958)
Obscure Japanese Film #254Shinjiro Ebara Kimura (Shinjiro Ebara) is a young stoker on the railway saving up to marry Yukiko (Satomi Oka), His best friend, Maeda (Tatsuya Nakadai), also works for…
A Summer Trip (川流不“熄”, Feng Keyu, 2021)
A wayward young man comes to understand more about himself and his family on a summer road trip with grandpa in Feng’s warmhearted drama
宮園かをり (Miyazono Kaori)
Who is Miyazono Kaori? Miyazono Kaori is a gifted violinist with a free-spirited personality and an unconventional approach to music. Her vibrant energy and bold demeanor mask a…
帰り道 ~The long road home~
Myself;Yourself concerns a city boy and the country girl. Both are people who grew up in the same place but went separate ways just before the edge of…
となりのメタラーさん
Author & Artist: マミタ (Mamita)Released April 2020 by Tokuma Shoten Publishing’s Chara ComicsGenre: Romance, Drama
Black Cat Mansion (亡霊怪猫屋敷, Nobuo Nakagawa, 1958)
A rationally minded doctor and his sickly wife find themselves trapped in the haunted house of post-war Japan in Nobuo Nakagawa’s eerie gothic horror
Ghost in the Regiment (憲兵と幽霊, Nobuo Nakagawa, 1958)
A treacherous military police officer comes to embody the evils of war in Nobuo Nakagawa’s eerie psychological horror.
![Featured image for Intimate Stranger 親密な他人 Dir: Mayu Nakamura [New York Asian Film Festival 2022]](https://cdn.aniblogtracker.com/live/20220719/1658245740.39984.69705.jpg)
Intimate Stranger 親密な他人 Dir: Mayu Nakamura [New York Asian Film Festival 2022]
Intimate Stranger 親密な他人 Dir: Mayu Nakamura [New York Asian Film Festival 2022]
Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 4 (不揃いの連理)
Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 4 (不揃いの連理) by Mikan Uji, is both a whimsical look at several Yuri odd couples and a profouns story about about found family and…
Great Absence (大いなる不在, Kei Chikaura, 2023)
A forced reconnection with his estranged father forces a young man to contemplate the great absences of life in Kei Chikaura’s poetic drama.
Ready O/R Knot (不日成婚, Anselm Chan, 2021)
A woman who wants to get married and her boyfriend who doesn’t end up engaged in an escalating battle of the sexes in Chan’s snarky marital farce
Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 3 (不揃いの連理)
In Volume 1, we met Iori and Minami, an career woman and a server at a izakaya whose relationship is surprisingly not fraught, and Saori and Shizuku, Iori’s…
Johnny Keep Walking! (年会不能停！, Dong Runnian, 2024)
An earnest factory experiences a rude awakening when he’s accidentally promoted to head office in Dong Runnian’s hilarious satirical comedy.
Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 2 (不揃いの連理)
In Volume 1, we met Tanaka Iori, a careerwoman with a job that she does not love, and a former juvenile delinquent girlfriend, Minami, whom she does. Ultimately,…
The Blind Menace (不知火検校, Kazuo Mori, 1960)
A blind sociopathic monk charts an unstoppable rise to power in Kazuo Mori’s bleak period drama.
Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 5 (不揃いの連理)
Mikanuji’s Fuzoroi no Renri, Volume 5 (不揃いの連理) continues as a smorgasbord of miscellaneous relationships between various couples. In this volume, we take time to expand on a few…
Bushido (碁盤斬り, Kazuya Shiraishi, 2024)
A stoical ronin’s peaceful life is disrupted by a face from the past in Kazuya Shiraishi’s elegantly lensed period drama.
Wind, Woman and Road (風と女と旅鴉, Tai Kato, 1958)
A wanderer returns home and finds himself torn between a desire for acceptance and revenge in an early Tai Kato jidaigeki.
The Hidden Fortress (隠し砦の三悪人, Akira Kurosawa, 1958)
A fugitive princess offers a new hope for a peaceful and prosperous socitey in Akira Kurosawa’s Sengoku-era epic.
The Invisible Wall / 眼の壁 / Me no kabe (‘Wall of Eyes’, 1958)
Obscure Japanese Film #137 Keiji Sada Masao Oda This Shochiku production stars Keiji Sada as Hagisaki, the deputy head of an accounts de...
Leave Me Alone (不想一個人, Fan Yang-chung, 2021)
A lovelorn gallery owner and ambitious pimp embark on a steamy affair but find themselves bound by their shared yet opposing desires in Fan Yang-chung’s steamy urban drama