Actor: Asao Sano

The Burmese Harp

In Burma during the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier separated from his unit disguises himself as a Buddhist monk to escape imprisonment as a POW.

Kagero-za

A 1920s playwright meets a beautiful woman who may be the ghost of his patron's deceased wife.

Cruel Story of Youth

A budding gangster enthralls a freeloading young woman, soon taking advantage of her knack for hitch-hiking to rob middle-class, middle-aged men.

Fires on the Plain

In the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier afflicted with tuberculosis is abandoned by his company and left to wander the Philippine island of Leyte.

Fighting Elegy

Kiroku boards with a Roman Catholic family and falls for the daughter Michiko. He ignores his feelings, joins a gang, gets in fights and, eventually, becomes involved with the radical Kita Ikki group.

May Love Be Restored

A tragic love story between a prostitute and a young trainee monk.

The Incident

The body of Sakai Hatsuko, a woman of 23 who has been slain with a knife, has been found in a forest. Some days later, Ueda Hiroshi, a 19-year-old shipyard worker, is arrested and charged with the murder. At Ueda's trial, a complex story unfolds.

The Man with a Shotgun

Ryoji, a wanderer, arrives in a remote mountain town, carrying a shotgun and claiming to be a hunter. He quickly becomes embroiled in a web of trouble surrounding the town's mill.

Black River

A university student moves into an apartment building and becomes involved with a waitress. The landlord then attempts to evict the tenants and sell the building through illicit means.

The Blazing Valiant

Jo has just come back to Japan for the funeral of his parents, who were killed in tribal warfare in Africa where the family had been living throughout most of Jo's life. Once the funeral was over, he missed the boat that was going to take him back home, and, because of an altered itinerary, he ends up stopping in a town for awhile -- striking up an acquaintance with a teenager and her grandfather when he captures their runaway horse. He would have been glad to leave after the proper amenities were completed, but the girl's journalist brother is murdered -- he was getting too close to wrapping a major news story. At that point, Jo and a friend cannot easily drop the matter as though nothing had occurred, and the two start to track down the source of the trouble -- a factory that makes poison gas for Third World buyers. Now their task is to dismantle the operation, prevent one train shipment from arriving at a transfer point, and find the journalist's killer.