Movies: Shozo Ichiyama

Four independent stories set in modern China about random acts of violence....

A detective breaks all rules of ethical conduct while investigating a colleague’s involvement in drug pushing and Yakuza activities....

Years after her boyfriend left her for the big city and promised to bring her there after he’s settled down, a Chinese woman sets out on a journey to be reunited with him....

At the end of the 19th century, Shanghai is divided into several foreign concessions. In the British concession, a number of luxurious “flower houses” are reserved for the male elite of the city. Since Chinese dignitaries are not allowed to frequent ...

The life of Tao, and those close to her, is explored in three different time periods: 1999, 2014, and 2025....

Itinerant Kurdish teachers, carrying blackboards on their backs, look for students in the hills and villages of Iran, near the Iraqi border during the Iran-Iraq war. Said falls in with a group of old men looking for their bombed-out village; he offer...

China's rapid changes from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, as seen through the lives of four performers in a theater troupe....

At Beijing World Park, a bizarre cross-pollination of Las Vegas and Epcot Center where visitors can interact with famous international monuments without ever leaving the city’s suburbs, a security guard betrays his dancer girlfriend by pursuing anoth...

As a decades-old state-run aeronautics munitions factory in downtown Chengdu, China is being torn down for the construction of the titular luxury apartment complex, director Jia Zhangke interviews various people affiliated with it about their experie...

Sidonie Perceval, an established French writer, is mourning her deceased husband. Invited to Japan for the reedition of her first book, she is welcomed by her local editor who takes her to Kyoto, the city of shrines and temples. As they travel toget...

Sukezo, a former manga comic artist, takes up the art rock business by setting up a shop in a shed by the river. He tries hard to be successful, but business does not go well and the family becomes progressively poorer....

Two disaffected, unemployed Chinese youth drift through life on the streets of their industrial town, their paths crossing with that of a local young singer and dancer working for a liquor company as a spokesmodel....

With Taiwan remaining in the grip of martial law in 1982, a group of filmmakers from that country set out to establish a cultural identity through cinema and to share it with the world. This engaging documentary looks at the movement's legacy....

Toichi is a boatman who ferries the villagers to a town on the other side of the river. Besides rowing a boat for the villagers all day long, he barely communicates with anyone except Genzo, a young neighbour. Upstream, a large bridge is being constr...

Ami, haunted by recurring apparitions, embarks on a journey from Singapore to Japan in search of her missing mother. Amidst the transforming landscapes, Ami's dreams, hauntings and lost mother unveil their true form....

In the Meiji Period, in the 19th century Japan, transitioning towards modernization, BLACK OX explores the relationship between man and ox, inspired by the “Ten Ox-Herding Pictures” a series of short poems and illustrations from Zen Buddhism traditio...

The Horse Thieves tells the story of gangsters who murder the father of a young family and steal the herd of horses that belonged to the village....

Yoji, a divorced and demoted Japanese man, chooses to head to Manila, believing that nobody is lonely in the Philippines....

An old Chinese woman visits Japan to find her missing daughter whom she adopted in post-WWII China. Her granddaughter and a retired Japanese policeman join her search....

Journalist Guo lives together with her mother and daughter in the same residence. The relation of three generations looks placid but there is actually a fierce undercurrent of rebellion and resistance....