With Saitama no rappa 2 (AKA 8000 Miles 2 – Girls Rapper), Yu Irie tells the story of amateur girl rappers who dream of a small big-time. The film opens with Saitama 1 B-boys, Ikku and Tom coming to town. They run into young Ayoma (Maho Yamada), inspiring her to gather her girlfriends and work up...
Koike Minami returns from USA to Japan to accomplish her deceased twin sister's wish to win a competition and sing with Avril Lavigne on the stage in a concert in Tokyo.
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...
Naomi Kawase describes Sakura Ando, the lead character in her film, as "a mysterious creature" who is "like a fairy. SEED is the story of the journey this girl takes from the enchanted nature of Nara to the chaos of Tokyo, and the encounters she has along the way. A boy offers her the gift of an...
High school student Mariko sings in the choir at the all-girls school she attends, and her biggest dream right now is to go to a music college. One day on her way home from school, she accidentally drops her bookbag into the sea. A man jumps into the water and recovers the bag for her, but all of...
About 150,000 illegal entrants live in Tokyo. They are not recognised as refugees and live in poor conditions. To protect themselves, the illegals create a secret organisation. The organisation has a bank which Japanese Financial Services Agency is not involved with, a hospital that is not...
How did an intimate film made on a modest budget win a Palme d'Or and attract 4 million viewers in Japan? With its principal craftsmen, including one-man band Hirokazu Kore-eda, we take a look back at a little gem of cinema made... with the family.
