The film depicts carnivalesque atmosphere summed up by the cry "Ei ja nai ka" ("Why not?") in Japan in 1867 and 1868 in the days leading to the Meiji Restoration. It examines the effects of the political and social upheaval of the time, and culminates in a revelrous march on the Tokyo Imperial Palace, which turns into a massacre. Characteristically, Imamura focuses not on the leaders of the country, but on characters in the lower classes and on the fringes of society.
A nameless ronin, or samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival ...
A group of travelers is stranded in a small country inn when the river floods during heavy rains. As...
Having put down his sword and given up the will to fight, the masterless samurai Iemon lives in soli...
Akira Kurosawa's lauded feudal epic presents the tale of a petty thief who is recruited to impersona...
This historical film depicts the life of a man who was at the mercy of the waves during transition f...
Tatsuya Nakadai, the world’s greatest living actor, returns to the screen in a brilliant adaptation ...
Kanichiro Yoshimura is a Samurai and Family man who can no longer support his wife and children on t...
Down-on-his-luck veteran Tsugumo Hanshirō enters the courtyard of the prosperous House of Iyi. Unemp...
Toshiro Mifune swaggers and snarls to brilliant comic effect in Kurosawa's tightly paced, beautifull...
Seibei Iguchi leads a difficult life as a low ranking samurai at the turn of the nineteenth century....
The background to and depiction of a watershed battle in Japanese history, at Sekigahara in 1600, wh...
Ogami Itto battles a group of female ninja in the employ of the Yagyu clan and must eliminate a trai...
Ryunosuke, a gifted swordsman plying his trade during the turbulent final days of Shogunate rule, ha...
In a poor district of Edo lives a young samurai named Soza. He has been sent by his clan to avenge t...
A look at the relationship between a young blind samurai and his wife, who will make a sacrifice in ...
In the Edo period, a nameless ronin accepts an assignment to go to a mountain pass and wait. Near th...
Lady Snowblood is caught by the police and sentenced to death for her crimes. As she is sent to the ...
Fearless Edo-period police inspector Hanzo Itami, nicknamed The Razor, has developed his own unique ...
The adventures of a blind, gambling masseur and master swordsman. Zatoichi targets a yakuza-controll...
Against the backdrop of the Edo treasury devaluing currency and driving many into poverty, Hanzo Ita...