Lighting
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A depressed ex-boxer (Yosuke Kubozuka) self-medicating for the injuries that ended his career finds a stray cat that brightens his day, but she is snatched up by a comical grungy mechanic (Kenji Furuya). Calling each other by the competing names they gave the cat, Maru and Lily, the odd pair is abruptly sucked into a political conspiracy with Saeko (Yui Ichikawa) and her son at the center. Witnessing another injustice in which the economic and social elite prey on the vulnerable, the two strays set off on the road to redemption, or at least peaceful cat ownership. (Fun fact: in addition to acting together in Alley Cat, Yosuke Kubozuka and Kenji “KJ” Furuya released the single “Soul Ship” in 2017. Kubozuka performs as Manji Line and Furuya in the band Dragon Ash.) -JAPAN CUTS: Festival of New Japanese Film
The tyrannical Lord Danjo Mikoshiba covets the rich, fertile lands surrounding Lake Yakumo. During a memorial ceremony for the late Chigusa lord, Mikoshiba launches an attack, overthrowing the honorable Lord Juro. Just when all seems lost, Daimajin rises from Lake Yakumo to settle a score of his own.
Early film by Kenji Misumi.
Film by director Kenji Misumi
The Fencing Master tells the story of a man trying to survive as the only world he knows is becoming increasingly irrelevant. Danpei Ichikawa lives for swordfighting – he was once a renowned kabuki swordfight choreographer, and as the Chairman of the New National Theatre Company, he wants nothing more than to choreograph the swordfights for the modern plays put on by the company.
First of nine films based on the novel. The first live-action adaptation focuses on the origins of how Akadô Suzunosuke learned his skills as a swordsman.
Ichikawa Raizo’s last film. He plays a Yakuza enforcer who kills a man on his boss's orders. He’s then sent to a provincial town to lie low, only to be caught in another war orchestrated by his original boss who has set him up.
The titular "tarantula" is a murderous woman who, along with the brother who is in love with her, kill without warrant because they are wealthy & above the law. Kyoshiro the homeless masterless wandering samurai has nothing to lose, & no scruples anyway, so can reproach even the powerful with ease. He is thus, for all that he has broad streaks of villainy all his own, a champion of the people by default.
A wandering gambler strolls into a village searching for his father's killer, unaware that the village is run by criminals who sell the poorest peasants into slavery.