Also known as 20世紀少年 / Twentieth Century Boys / 20th Century Boys 1: Beginning of the End / 20-seiki shonen

Genre: Mystery, Science Fiction

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: August, 2008

The trilogy of 20th Century Boys live-action films (directed by Yukihiko Tsutsumi) is set to be one of the biggest undertakings ever in the Japanese movie industry. The project not only has a budget of 6 billion yen, but it was revealed that it will feature a cast of 300 people. As a side note it must be said that the movie follows the story portrayed in manga almost to the letter.

Genre: Mystery

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: June, 2007

One year after the suicide of C-list model Miki, five of her fans come together for a commemorative meeting: fan club leader Iemoto (Oguri Shun), Oda Yuji (Yusuke Santamaria), Snake (Koide Keisuke), Yasuo (Muga Tsukaji), and Ichigo Musume (Kagawa Teruyuki). Sitting down together for the first time, they reminisce about their idol, wondering how someone so bright and beautiful could have possibly taken her own life. It just doesn’t make sense. That’s when they reach a revelation - she must have been murdered! The five heatedly discuss her death, expressing their suspicions and weighing the many clues and possibilities. The more they talk, the more the case takes shape in their minds, and the closer they come to the truth..

Also known as ジョゼと虎と魚たち / Joze to tora to sakana tachi

Genre: Romance

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: December, 2003

Tsuneo is a university student working part-time in a mah-jong parlour. Lately the customers have been talking about an old lady who pushes a baby carriage through the streets. They say she is carrying something for a crime syndicate, and they wonder what it is she has in the carriage… Money? Drugs? One day, the owner of the mah-jong parlour sends Tsuneo out to walk his dog. A baby carriage comes rolling down a hill and crashes into a guard rail. The old lady asks him to look into the carriage, where he finds a young woman clutching a knife. This is how Tsuneo first meets the girl who calls herself Josée. Her real name is Kumiko, and she is unable to walk, so her grandmother takes her out early every morning in the old baby carriage. To thank Tsuneo for his help, they offer him breakfast, and he begins to fall under the spell of the young woman’s unusual charm. Kumiko has named herself after the heroine of a novel by Françoise Sagan, and Tsuneo comes to call this strange girl by that name. He grows more and more attracted to her.

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: January, 2010

Set in Japan in the 1990s, there’s one rising band called LANDS, that is starting to find success amidst a flood of other bands. Asako and Miharu are two Tokyo high school students. When Miharu gives Asako her favorite indie rock band; a LANDS CD, she becomes an overnight fan and sets her heart on the talented guitarist Yukiya. When they go to see them in concert, they sneak their way into the backstage area and Asako gets acquainted with some of the band’s members. Natsu, the vocalist, is immediately attracted to Asako and begins bringing her along to the band’s practice sessions. Though Asako enjoys it, she proves to be a distraction to the other band members and is soon ejected from the session by Yukari, their manager. But Natsu is determined to keep her around, pulling strings to make Yukari and Asako to become friends, and eventually, helping Asako to become LANDS co-manager. LANDS was formed among friends, but as the band begins to climb the ladder towards major stardom, they get in touch with the dark side of the music industry, discord surfaces, inevitable frictions emerge, and unrequited love strains their friendship, threatening to pull their bonds apart.

Genre: Action

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: September, 2009

It is 17th century Japan and from a young age Kamui has been considered something of an outcast, even within his own ninja clan. Disillusioned with the laws and principles, which dictate that he must use his skills to kill others, Kamui chooses to leave his past behind him and go in search of true freedom. But for a ninja liberation comes at a price and the only way to escape the bonds of the ninja brotherhood is to die. Now a fugitive on the run from his clan, who are determined to hunt him down and eliminate him for his betrayal, Kamui finds himself constantly fighting for his life and unable to trust anyone. He eventually finds some solace when he meets an indomitable fisherman who saves his life and invites him to settle with his family. Unexpectedly, the arrangement brings Kamui face to face with a long-forgotten nemesis of his, another renegade ninja with a deadly score to settle. Meanwhile, the ninja army hunting Kamui is setting a trap from which there can be no escape…

Genre: Comedy, School

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: July, 2009

A passionate teacher, Kumiko Yamaguchi, a.k.a. Yankumi, is now overseeing the new students of Class 3D of Akado High School, who still have not opened up to her and are giving her a hard time. One day, the students of 3D get harassed by street hoodlums. Then, Reita, a leader figure of 3D, shows up and beats up the hoodlums, yelling “Keep your hands off my friends.” The next day, the guys beat up by Reita come storming into their school. Principal Sawatari berates the students for getting mixed up with a gang, and gives Kumiko an ultimatum: “You’re fired the next time a 3D student gets into trouble.” Then Reita tells Kumiko that he doesn’t want to owe her anything, and he takes off by himself to settle the score with the gang… Meanwhile, trouble was also brewing for the former 3D student who just graduated. The police are after Ren for being involved in an illegal drug transaction. Upset Kumiko tries to find him with the other former 3D students. However, they later find out from her grandfather, the head of the Oedo Family, the shocking identity of the mastermind pulling the strings of the drug deal Ren is being accused of…

Also known as Rofuto / ロフト

Genre: Horror, Thriller

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: October, 2005

Suffering from writer’s block, Reiko (Nakatani Miki) moves to a countryside villa at her editor’s beckoning, to quietly work on her next novel. Her new environment turns out to be anything but peaceful when she catches sight of her next door neighbor surreptitiously moving a thousand-year-old mummified corpse into his university lab for research. Though Reiko and her neighbor get off to a bumpy start, the two grow closer over time, enough so that Reiko eventually agrees to hide the mummy in her home. But the mummy isn’t the only unlikely guest within the walls, there’s someone or something else lurking in the background…

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: September, 2007

Matsuda plays Ko, a third year junior high student during the 1980s that fights all through class and acts like a punk. One day he changes bodies with the school honor student!

Also known as Ballad: Na mo naki koi no uta / BALLAD 名もなき恋のうた

Genre: Action

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: September, 2009

Shinichi runs away from his problems and the people he fears. When Shinichi prays to the great Kawakami oak tree for courage, he is plunged into ancient feudal Japan. He awakens in the province of Kasuga, in the midst of a battle. It is there he meets the great warrior samurai, called the Demon Ijiri. Ijiri is a worthy adversary in battle, but he proves to be a less successful lover. He has been in love with Princess Ren since his youth. She has fiercely loved him in return, rebuking offers of marriage in the hopes of marrying for love. When the powerful Lord Takatura asks for her hand in marriage, she dares not refuse him for the safety of her kingdom. When Shinichi’s family emerges from the future to search for him, they bring stirring news to the town elders. The Kasuga province had never been recorded in history, and their enduring battles with other clans were seemingly fruitless. In light of this news, Princess Ren is relinquished of her duty to marry the formidable Lord Takatura. Ijiri is overjoyed, as is the Princess Ren. Yet Lord Takatura is unaccustomed to rejection, and his rage results in a fearsome battle.

Genre: Romance

Category: Japanese Movie

Film Date: October, 2009

Takuma, a boy who is told he will die before he’s 20, and Mayu, a girl who is in love with him… The story begins when they are little kids. Mayu, whose father is a doctor, meets Takuma, who is hospitalized in her father’s workplace. They develop feelings for each other, but Mayu learns of Takuma’s grave illness and that he will die before he turns 20. The distraught children make one promise for an uncertain future. Time passes, and the girl becomes a young woman, and the boy, a young man. Mayu continues to support and love Takuma. On the other hand, Takuma, who knows his days are numbered, pushes away his feelings for Mayu and distances himself from her. He cannot stand to see her cry or hurt her more than he already has. Then Mayu meets another man who has feelings for her, and Takuma meets a woman who has the same illness, and their feelings for each other begin to waver. Misunderstandings, unsaid thoughts, the frustrations and chagrin of youth… What will become of their love while the clock keeps ticking away in Takuma’s life?