Japanese Story

Feb 22, 2022 — The fourth feature by the Hong Kong filmmaker Ann Hui devastatingly lays bare the conditions that spurred hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese to flee after the fall of Saigon.

Nov 8, 2016 — This adaptation of one of the most influential series in manga history is a delirious mix of breathtaking swordplay and pop vulgarity.

Oct 28, 2011 — The following is excerpted from a 1972 interview that film scholar Joan Mellen conducted with director Kaneto Shindo. The interview originally appeared in the 1975 book Voices from the Japanese Cinema. I find the social dimension of your films very...

Mar 18, 2024 — Among this month’s highlights are a collection of noir classics from the genre’s peak year, a Jean Eustache retrospective, and our favorite movies that unfold within a tight timespan between dusk and dawn.

Sep 22, 2021 — Wes Anderson collects his favorite New Yorker stories, and Werner Herzog has written his first novel.

Aug 7, 2017 — The Venice International Film Festival, whose seventy-fourth edition runs from August 30 through September 9, has not only revamped its site, it’s also added three films to its lineup. John Woo’s Manhunt will premiere Out of Competition. “A contemporary remake...

Jul 13, 2010 — At the author’s request, Japanese names are given here in their traditional form: surname first. Nineteen thirty-six was a decisive year for imperial Japan, marked by extreme violence at home and abroad. In the very early morning of February 26,...

Apr 27, 2009 — The idea of making a film about Japan’s most famous sex crime, with a decent budget and in conditions of complete freedom, reawakened Nagisa Oshima’s desire to direct—and the prospect of circumventing Japanese censorship must have made the decision even...

Nov 19, 2007 — Akira Kurosawa explores criminal machismo in his seventh film, which he felt was his official breakthrough in Japanese cinema.

Feb 5, 2026 — Bong Joon Ho, Park Chan-wook, and Hong Sangsoo select films to screen in a series celebrating the Korean Film Archive.