Takeshi Kitano plays a man named Joon-pyong Kim, aka Kim Shunpei who leaves his South Korean home in 1923 to seek power and fortune in Osaka, Japan. Facing discrimination and forced into hard labor, his resilience and determination allows him to build up his own fish cake business. He proves to be a ruthless business owner, but he can never seem to get enough money. Eventually his greed eventually leads him into loansharking where his cruel nature really comes through.

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A teenage boy named Seita and his 5-year-old sister Setsuko lose their mother in an air raid during World War II while their father is out at sea fighting in the Japanese Navy. At first they live with a distant aunt, but her cruelty forces them out on their own. With rationing in effect nobody is willing to give them food, so Seita does whatever he can to find something to eat for his severely malnourished sister. For the teaser, see this link.

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At first blush, Yoshimitsu Morita’s The Mamiya Brothers may seem like a goofy comedy about two hopeless otakus desperately trying to pick up chicks. And while that’s partially true, it’s actually a sincere story of two well meaning, yet emotionally stunted brothers who try to break free from the bubble they’ve created for themselves over the years and catch up on some of the socialization they missed in a youth spent joined at the hip. The trouble, however, is that their particular bubble offers a lot of comfort and protection from an unforgiving world full of complicated notions like cruelty, infidelity, and heartbreak—none of which they’ve ever had to experience while leaning on each other.

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A woman (Miki Nakatani) allows herself to be kidnapped in a scheme to trick her rich businessman husband into paying a ransom. The man helping her (Masato Hagiwara) returns home one day to find her dead. Left with no other option he buries her corpse out in the middle of the woods. At least he thinks he does… For the teaser, see this link.

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Two awkward, but well-meaning brothers decide that in order to get popular they have to take a break from obsessing over their otaku interests and try to meet girls. Things go well at first and they meet a few new friends along the way, but eventually it begins to seem like a complicated life just isn’t in the cards for them. For the teaser, see this link.

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