Yasuko, a housewife, lives in an urban high-rise apartment with her husband Satoru and her son Takuto. Annoyed by spam calls and door-to-door salesmen, Yasuko slams the door on a salesman’s hand when he tries to squeeze a flyer through the apartment's chained front door. He leaves, but the next...
In the early 1200s, Dogen brought Chinese Zen philosophy to Japan, and established the Japanese Zen school of Buddhism. He taught that a person was capable of realizing Buddhahood within himself, by way of Zazen. Zazen is extended hours of sitting and meditating to achieve a state of “Mu”...
Set in a barren, futuristic Tokyo of highways and wastelands, a rowdy group of punk bands and their fans gather to protest slow, boring, Japanese living.
A freelance writer is given a bizarre assignment by the sexy editor of "Black Book Monthly": find a bug with the power to bring humans back from the dead, in order to report on the afterlife. With his trusty companion Endo in tow, he sets off on a quest for the elusive insect and along the way...
Shiro's struggle with his father's cancer and impending death leads to a realization that he must communicate his love and admiration for him before it's too late. A series of flashbacks reveals their relationship over time, and the trouble Shiro faced connecting to his strict father who was also...
Hitoshi Nagano, who works at an electronics store, picks up a cellphone left behind by a customer and goes about a scam. He calls the person's mother and pretends to be her son. He then gets the mother to transfer money to his bank account. Soon, Hitoshi gets a lot more than he bargained for.
27-year-old Hatsumi Takimoto is a former teacher and now waitress. She holds a secret. Three years after her boyfriend died, she receives a letter from him. After meeting a former student, Hatsumi Takimoto confesses about her past.
A 16-year-old girl works in a factory to pay her late father’s debt. When she makes up her mind to become a hostess, a boy approaches her with kind and gentle manners...(Also occasionally known in English as “Play”)
Satoru Mizushima is a designer, who prefers traditional things like handmade items and handwritten works. One day, he happens to meet a mysterious woman, Miyuki Miharu, at the cafe named Piano. She seems to have similar values to him and he is attracted to her. Satoru asks for Miyuki's cellphone...
Akiyama is an intern, disgusted with the noise pollution caused by the bullet trains and the heart attacks that noise has been causing in older hospital patients, plots to disrupt and, in ten days, destroy a unit of the operation. He warns the Japan National Railway, that, if nothing is done to...
Shuji Tokita (Eiji Okuda) is a film director and a professor at a university. He goes through a difficult time trying to film his new movie. He believes his movies reflect his own personal expriences. A female high school student, Ritsuko (Yukino Murakami), appears in front of Shuji.
Inuyama is intrigued by the existence of "Jake," a mysterious crocodile that has been sighted in many countries around the world. He continues to travel around the world, listening to the testimonies of various people of different ages, nationalities, and sighting situations who have seen "Jake".
Ai is a call girl that makes good money for what she does but there’s always at risk no matter how good the money is. The job makes her feel free and in control and likes the danger that surrounds her. Her clients vary from normal to weird but her new client: Mr. Mamiya is… different. Mamiya is...
Yuko is in love with an old poet who happens to be also a married man. She waits patiently for him and only him, yet she is constantly being lust by others.
Mainly the story of Shinsuke and his stepmother, ranging from Shinsuke's infanthood to his mid-teens. Coal workers and the mines dominate nearly every aspect of the life of the characters. Shinsuke's father dies while bravely using dynamite to rescue a group of trapped Korean miners. Several older...
