Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9, “From the New World” wafts through a hospice recreation room. Sitting at the grand piano is a young girl, Chiori, with a prodigious ability to play…
Commencing well-respected Nippon director Kazuo Kuroki’s sixth decade behind the camera, “A Boy’s Summer in 1945” (literally “A Beautiful Summer in Kirishima”) is a lyric, novelistic drama set in the…
In the summer of 1947, various men and women gather at a mansion in the countryside at the invitation of Kazuma Utagawa. They are artists, novelists, poets, painters, playwrights, actresses,…
The young and beautiful Sada Abe, the daughter of a rich merchant, is banished for losing her virginity after being raped by a college student. Sada wanders the city, becoming…
It’s the evening before the day all brothels must be shut-down, according to the new law, in 1958. At the Kofukuya’s (literally, the house that sells happiness), five prostitutes decide…
