A great famine struck all of Japan: the so-called Great Tenpō famine. It was a time when there were frequent uprisings in rural areas due to farmers losing their land as a result of strict tax collection. The Tonegawa area of Boso was a lawless area for a generation, as two major forces...
A documentary made at the very end of the Showa era, looking back at traditional agricultural models as they still existed at the beginning of this same era (in the 1930s). A working year is recreated in Kanegasaki (Iwate Prefecture, Tohoku region). From "threshing the paddy fields" with a hoe in...