Kôji Yakusho

Doppelgänger, Kurosawa Kiyoshi

Michio Hayasaki, a brilliant developer of medical instruments, is working on a robot chair, equipped with artificial limbs, for people who are completely paralysed. He feels he is being pressed by his employer Medical Cytech to come up with a successful design at short notice and he is in danger of burning out. Then, one evening, he thinks he sees his double. Hayasaki has the shock of his life: superstition suggests that meeting your double means you will soon die. But, after a confrontation with his maladjusted doppelgänger, it becomes clear that Hayasaki could take advantage of his violent tricks. The double reduces Hayasaki’s lab to rubble, clears another double out of the way, hires an assistant for Hayasaki and comes up with a new lab. But in the end, one of them will have to perish…Read More »

A 48-year-old company chief, Yukihiro Fujiyama (Koji Yakusho) goes to a hospital. There he discovered that he has got terminal lung cancer and will die within half a year. He declines any treatment and decides to go to see some people he has not met for years, to write farewell letters to his family, relatives and friends…Read More »

A businessman kills his adulterous wife and is sent to prison. After the release, he opens a barbershop and meets new people, talking almost to no one except an eel he befriended while in prison.Read More »

An impossible tale. Taro, an old man who dies homeless in Tokyo has told Yosuke, a weak-willed out-of-work salaryman about a golden statue that he left years ago in a house by the sea in Noto. Yosuke goes and he’s captivated by Saeko, a young women who lives in the house where Taro left the statue. She has a strange affliction: water builds up in her and she can only vent it by wicked acts, such as shoplifting, or, more powerfully, through orgasm. Yosuke obliges, the water gives him life, as well as the plants and fish it reaches. Saeko feels shame, and she has a past. Taro’s ghost urges Yosuke to fulfill his desires, but can the relationship survive? Written by Read More »

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The tale of an eccentric band of culinary ronin who guide the widow of a noodle-shop owner on her quest for the perfect recipe, this rapturous “ramen western” by Japanese director Juzo Itami is an entertaining, genre-bending adventure underpinned by a deft satire of the way social conventions distort the most natural of human urges—our appetites. Interspersing the efforts of Tampopo (Nobuko Miyamoto) and friends to make her café a success with the erotic exploits of a gastronome gangster and glimpses of food culture both high and low, the sweet, sexy, and surreal Tampopo is a lavishly inclusive paean to the sensual joys of nourishment, and one of the most mouthwatering examples of food on film ever made.Read More »

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Following a deadly bus hijacking in southwest Japan, the three survivors–Makato (Koji Yakusho), the bus driver; Kozue (Aoi Miyazaki), a young girl; and Naoki (Masaru Miyazaki), her older brother–find further tragedy in their personal lives. When the traumatized Makato eventually contacts Kozue and Naoki two years later, he moves into their home and becomes a father figure for the two children, who have stopped speaking. The trio are then joined by Akihiko (Yohichiroh Saitoh), Kozue and Naoki’s college student cousin, and together this odd surrogate family embarks on a road trip across Japan. However, a string of murders appears to be following them and threatens to permanently disrupt their quest to regain normal lives.Read More »

The tragic tale of two lovers whose passion burns so intensely it destroys them. Based on the bestselling novel by Junichi Watanabe, is about the fated love affair between Shoichiro, a middle-aged man who has come to regret devoting his whole life to his work, and Rinko, a beautiful woman trapped in a married life filled with depression and disillusion. A man engaged to Soichiro’s daughter, Chika, has fallen in love with Rinko, and Soichiro meets with her to ask her to end the relationship. However, despite their unpleasant first meeting, soon Shoichiro and Rinko find themselves drawn to each other, and find in each other something that had been missing in their lives. Their burning passion heightens, until their yearning for everlasting, perfect love leads to a fateful decision.Read More »

Plot from IMDB: An experienced police detective has to investigate the murder of an unknown woman dressed in a scarlet dress. All the clues he finds relate to him, which troubles him a lot. A ghost dressed in a scarlet dress soon starts appearing to him while more murders are discovered: all victims were drowned in salt water.Read More »

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A seasoned detective is called in to rescue a politician held hostage by a lunatic. In a brief moment of uncertainty, he misses the chance for action. Leaving his job and family without explanation, he makes his way to a mountain forest, where there is a peculiar tree called charisma. Should it be destroyed or protected? People stand divided over this one tree.Read More »