My Voiceless Friends(1972)

The Idiot(ja)

A gentle, war-shattered ex-soldier, Kinji Kameda, arrives in wintry Hokkaidō and is pulled into a volatile tangle of love and pity between the disgraced Taeko Nasu, the proud Ayako, and his possessive friend Akama. Kameda’s saintly compassion exposes everyone’s wounds, steering the quartet toward jealousy, violence, and inexorable tragedy. Adapted from Dostoevsky’s novel.

Kabei: Our Mother(ja)

Set in Tokyo in 1940, the peaceful life of the Nogami Family suddenly changes when the father, Shigeru, is arrested and accused of being a Communist. His wife Kayo works frantically from morning to night to maintain the household and bring up her two daughters with the support of Shigeru's sister Hisako and Shigeru's ex-student Yamazaki, but her husband does not return. WWII breaks out and casts dark shadows on the entire country, but Kayo still tries to keep her cheerful determination, and sustain the family with her love. This is an emotional drama of a mother and an eternal message for peace.

Gate of Flesh(ja)

The background is Yuraku-cho in Tokyo and the film shows how desperately the women, who had led sheltered lives before the war, struggled to keep alive and the innate strength of post-war women.

The Return of the Native(en)

Eustacia Vye, an exquisite beauty despairing at her boring life on an English moor, sets up a fateful lovers' triangle when she uses her wiles to entice two men, a dashing suitor and a successful man who made his name abroad and returned to his home on the heath.

Mother(en)

A neurotic, twice-divorced sci-fi writer moves back in with his mother to solve his personal problems.

Shadow of Fire(ja)

In the black market, a war orphan is confronted with the struggles of people living in the immediate aftermath of WWII.

Good Morning(ja)

A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of inter­generational relationships, Good Morning tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his child protagonists. Shot in stunning color and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors’ new washing machine and unemployed husbands look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy refashions Ozu’s own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.

Dead Angle(ja)

Elite college graduates commit perfect financial crimes though loopholes in the law during the 1950s.

Early Spring(ja)

A young Tokyo salary man and his wife struggle within the confines of their passionless relationship while he has an extramarital affair.

I Live in Fear(ja)

An aging foundry patriarch, gripped by terror of nuclear annihilation, tries to uproot his family to Brazil. When they petition to have him declared incompetent, a family-court counselor witnesses his obsession slide into ruin—and asks whether ignoring the atomic threat is any saner.

House of Bamboo(en)

Eddie Kenner is given a special assignment by the Army to get the inside story on Sandy Dawson, a former GI who has formed a gang of fellow servicemen and Japanese locals.

Madadayo(ja)

In postwar Tokyo, beloved writer-professor Hyakken Uchida retires and is buoyed through hardship by the fierce devotion of his former students, who honor him each year with a raucous “Not yet!” birthday toast. Told in warm, gently comic vignettes, Kurosawa’s farewell celebrates aging, friendship, and the sustaining ritual of teacher and pupils refusing to say goodbye.

Barefoot Gen(ja)

A story about the effect of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima on a boy's life and the lives of the Japanese people.

Barefoot Gen 2(ja)

Three years after the Hiroshima bombing, a teenager helps a group of orphans to survive and find their new life.

Wenn die Heide blüht(de)

Five Fingers for Marseilles(en)

Years ago, the young Five Fingers fought for the rural town of Marseilles against brutal police oppression. Now, after fleeing in disgrace, Tau, one of them, returns to Marseilles, seeking only a peaceful life. When he finds the town under new threat, he must reluctantly fight to free it.

M.V.(sh)

An immigrant returns home in Montenegro after spending years in America.

Aller retour(sh)

The story of a group of people who came to France to the temporary work, their sufferings, persecutions, and a constant struggle for survival.

Street of Shame(ja)

The lives of five sex workers employed at a Japanese brothel while the nation is debating the passage of an anti-prostitution law.

Ungiven(hr)

Determined to move on with their life violently interrupted by war several years ago, an elderly couple returns to their restored home. We follow their everyday life through the four seasons. Every day She becomes more absent and lost. Instead of helping her, He acts brutishly, sometimes even cruelly, towards his wife. However, the realization that something is wrong with Her will make Him question his behavior and values.