Kinema Junpo's Top 200 Japanese Films of All Time (2009)

An old couple visit their children and grandchildren in the city, but receive little attention.

Farmers from a village exploited by bandits hire a veteran samurai for protection, and he gathers six other samurai to join him.

A tragic social drama set in post war Japan about a lonely woman trying to find purpose and stability in a devastated Tokyo.

In the last days of the Shogunate, a resourceful grifter seeks to outwit competing prostitutes, rebellious samurai and other inhabitants of a brothel in order to survive the hardened times.

During the violent chaos of post-War Japanese black market, a young gangster called Shozo Hirono has to keep up with the rapid shifts of power between unscrupulous bosses.

Schoolteacher Hisako Oishi forms an emotional bond with her pupils and teaches them various virtues, while at the same time worrying about their future.

The rape of a bride and the murder of her samurai husband are recalled from the perspectives of a bandit, the bride, the samurai's ghost and a woodcutter.

A man gets rid of a cheap pot without knowing it contains a map to a treasure. As word spreads, many join in hunting it.

Japanese parents hire a tutor for their foolish son and get a critic of their lifestyle.

A high school science teacher builds an atomic bomb and uses it to extort the nation, but cannot decide what he wants. Meanwhile, a determined cop is catching up to him, as is radiation poisoning.

During a sweltering summer, a rookie homicide detective seeks advice from a seasoned colleague while trying to track down his stolen Colt pistol.

The movie takes place in the five-day period before, during and after a ferocious, seemingly liberating typhoon, which several students endure while marooned in their school gymnasium.

A bureaucrat tries to find meaning in his life after he discovers he has terminal cancer.

A couple stand indecisively on a bridge in Asakusa. Tsutae and Yoshiji have lost confidence and passion for their future as they get on the bus for Tsukishima and get off at Suzaki. Across the bridge they see the sign for Suzaki Paradise, a red-light district where Tsutae once worked as a prostitute. Tsutae spots an ad for a waitress at a bar near the bridge and she rushes in to get the job. The kind hearted madam, Tokuko, helps them out by hiring Tsutae and finding work for Yoshiji delivering noodles. But the wanton Tsutae is soon attracted to Ochiai, a rich, generous man who owns an electrical shop specializing in radios.

An executive of a Yokohama shoe company becomes a victim of extortion when his chauffeur's son is kidnapped by mistake and held for ransom.

Three thieves escape from a heist, one of them killing the other two. He is sheltered by a prostitute and sought after by the police, but only after ten years his true motivation unravels.

When a ronin requesting seppuku at a feudal lord's palace is told of the brutal suicide of another ronin who previously visited, he reveals how their pasts are intertwined - and in doing so challenges the clan's integrity.

A housewife living under her tyrannical husband has her life stressfully turned upside down after getting raped by a burglar.

Kon Ichikawa examines the beauty and rich drama on display at the 1964 Summer Games in Tokyo, creating a record of observations that range from the expansive to the intimate.

Detectives investigate the murder of an old man found in a Tokyo rail yard.

A young man has to break up with his girlfriend in order to get married with his rich cousin but things won't go smoothly.

Warrior and pacifist Princess Nausicaä desperately struggles to prevent two warring nations from destroying themselves and their dying planet.

The lives of two slum neighbors, one of a happy-go-lucky gambler and the other of a poor ronin, converge when the two get involved with the affairs of a powerful samurai official and his gangsters.

A crafty ronin comes to a town divided by two criminal gangs and decides to play them against each other to free the town.

During the 1930s, a teenager yearns for a Catholic girl, whose only desire is to reform his sinful tendencies. Hormones raging, the young man channels his unsatisfied lust into the only outlet available: savage, crazed violence.