Five loosely connected storylines concerning the secrets and lies, the fears and tears, and the puerile potty jokes that punctuate the characters' daily (and in one eerie case, nightly) encounters.
The advertising director of Pacific Pharmaceuticals, frustrated with the low ratings of their sponsored TV program, seeks a more sensationalist approach. He orders his staff to Faro Island to capture King Kong for exploitation. As Godzilla re-emerges, a media frenzy generates with Pacific looking to capitalize off of the ultimate battle.
キングコング対ゴジラ
1962
6
Journalists Ichiro Sakai and Junko cover the wreckage of a typhoon when an enormous egg is found and claimed by greedy entrepreneurs. Mothra's fairies arrive and are aided by the journalists in a plea for its return. As their requests are denied, Godzilla arises near Nagoya and the people of Infant Island must decide if they are willing to answer Japan's own pleas for help.
モスラ対ゴジラ
1964
7
The time spent between professional Shogi player Kiriyama and his three stories helps to heal his wounds. As he prepares to secure another win in an upcoming tournament, the father who left the three sisters appears and disturbs the peace.
3月のライオン 後編
2017
7
In the future, the Japanese government captures a class of ninth-grade students and forces them to kill each other under the revolutionary "Battle Royale" act.
バトル・ロワイアル
2000
7
A family of four are the sole inhabitants of a small island, where they struggle each day to irrigate their crops.
裸の島
1960
8
Returning to their lord's castle, samurai warriors Washizu and Miki are waylaid by a spirit who predicts their futures. When the first part of the spirit's prophecy comes true, Washizu's scheming wife, Asaji, presses him to speed up the rest of the spirit's prophecy by murdering his lord and usurping his place. Director Akira Kurosawa's resetting of William Shakespeare's "Macbeth" in feudal Japan is one of his most acclaimed films.
蜘蛛巣城
1957
7
Kanji Watanabe is a middle-aged man who has worked in the same monotonous bureaucratic position for decades. Learning he has cancer, he starts to look for the meaning of his life.
生きる
1952
8
Set 10 years after "Kids Return." Shinji and Masaru have graduated from high school with different paths in their lives. Shinji attempted to become boxer and Masaru a yakuza. They both tried to rise to the top of their respective fields.
キッズ・リターン 再会の時
2013
5
In a small Tokyo apartment, twelve-year-old Akira must care for his younger siblings after their mother leaves them and shows no sign of returning.
誰も知らない
2004
7
The director of a theatre company is in crisis and his actors have lost confidence in him. One day he meets a woman wearing the same shoes as him, immediately sparking chemistry between the two.
劇場
2020
7
A high school girl and boy are part of the student council at a pricey school. They have a crush on one another, but have kept it under wraps so far. With awareness and an inkling of what the other one feels for each the challenge becomes to make the opposite side profess his or her love first.
かぐや様は告らせたい ～天才たちの恋愛頭脳戦～
2019
7
Mika works as a nurse by day; by night she entertains covetous men at a girls' bar. Shinji is blind in one eye and ekes out a living as a construction worker. Young and grown-up at the same time, they both lead a lonely existence, but somehow their paths keep miraculously crossing under the Tokyo sky.
夜空はいつでも最高密度の青色だ
2017
6
Young coal miner Takeda leaves Kyushu in search of a better job in Tokyo, only to fall into the lucrative yet dangerous life of a yakuza.
ごろつき無宿
1971
5
Oda Nobunaga and Nōhime were originally married to mend a hostile relationship between neighbouring regions. Unfortunately, they were like oil and water, making for a somewhat unhappy marriage. When Oda's enemy, Imagawa Yoshimoto, attacks Owari with his vast army, Oda is devastated by the overwhelming gap in military strength. However, Nohime encourages him not to despair, and the pair draw up a tactical plan that will allow them to overcome the odds.
THE LEGEND & BUTTERFLY
2023
6
Dolls takes puppeteering as its overriding motif, which relates thematically to the action provided by the live characters. Chief among those tales is the story of Matsumoto and Sawako, a young couple whose relationship is about to be broken apart by the former's parents, who have insisted their son take part in an arranged marriage to his boss' daughter.
ドールズ
2002
7
Four people recount different versions of the story of a man's murder and the rape of his wife.
羅生門
1950
8
A story of three escort girls living in Ikebukuro, Tokyo. They work at the same escort service while feeling lonely in their urban lives.
牝猫たち
2017
5
A lawyer tasked with defending a robbery-and-murder suspect begins developing doubts about what truly happened.
三度目の殺人
2017
6
Blind traveler Zatoichi is a master swordsman and a masseur with a fondness for gambling on dice games. When he arrives in a village torn apart by warring gangs, he sets out to protect the townspeople.
座頭市
2003
7
A samurai answers a village's request for protection after he falls on hard times. The town needs protection from bandits, so the samurai gathers six others to help him teach the people how to defend themselves, and the villagers provide the soldiers with food.
七人の侍
1954
8