"Actor: Eiji Okada"

• Akio Jissoji: The Buddhist Trilogy | Blu Ray | (19/08/2019) from £29.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Akio Jissôji created a rich and diverse body of work during his five decades in Japan s film and television industries. For some, he is best-known for his science-fiction: the 1960s TV series Ultraman and 1998 s box-office success Tokyo: The Last Megalopolis. For others, it is his 1990s adaptations of horror and mystery novelist Edogawa Rampo, such as Watcher in the Attic and Murder on D Street. And then there are his New Wave films for the Art Theatre Guild, three of which This Transient Life, Mandara and Poem, forming The Buddhist Trilogy are collected here. Winner of the Golden Leopard award at the 1970 Locarno Film Festival, This Transient Life is among the Art Theatre Guild s most successful and most controversial productions. The film concerns a brother and sister from a rich family who defy the expectations placed on them: he has little interest in further education or his father s business, instead obsessing over Buddhist statues; she continually refuses a string of suitors and the prospect of marriage. Their closeness, and isolation, gives way to an incestuous relationship which, in turn, breeds disaster. Mandara, Jissôji s first colour feature, maintained the controversial subject matter, focussing on a cult who recruit through rape and hope to achieve true ecstasy through sexual release. Shot, as with all of Jissôji s Art Theatre Guild works, in a radically stylised manner, the film sits somewhere between the pinku genre and the fiercely experimental approach of his Japanese New Wave contemporaries. The final entry in the trilogy, Poem, returns to black and white and is centred on the austere existence of a young houseboy who becomes helplessly embroiled in the schemes of two brothers. Written by Toshirô Ishidô (screenwriter of Nagisa Ôshima s The Sun s Burial and Shôhei Imamura s Black Rain), who also penned This Transient Life and Mandala, Poem continues the trilogy s exploration of faith in a post-industrial world. LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentations of This Transient Life, Mandara and Poem Original uncompressed LPCM mono 1.0 audio on all three films Newly translated optional English subtitles Introductions to all three films by David Desser, author of Eros Plus Massacre: An Introduction to the Japanese New Wave Scene-select commentaries on all three films by Desser Theatrical trailer for Mandara Theatrical trailer for Poem Limited edition packaging, fully illustrated by maarko phntm Illustrated 80-page perfect-bound collector s book featuring new writings on the film by Anton Bitel and Tom Mes

• Hiroshima | Blu Ray | (13/07/2020) from £16.39   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  Hiroshima (1953) is a powerful evocation of the devastation wrought by the world's first deployment of the atomic bomb and its aftermath, based on the written eye-witness accounts of its child survivors compiled by Dr. Arata Osada for the 1951 book Children Of The A Bomb: Testament Of The Boys And Girls Of Hiroshima. Adapted for the screen by independent director Hideo Sekigawa (Listen to the Voices of the Sea, Tokyo Untouchable) and screenwriter Yasutaro Yagi (Theatre of Life, Rice), Hiroshima combines a harrowing documentary realism with moving human drama, in a tale of the suffering, endurance and survival of a group of teachers, their students and their families. It boasts a rousing score composed by Akira Ifukube (Godzilla) and an all-star cast including Yumeji Tsukioka (Late Spring, The Eternal Breasts), Isuzu Yamada (Throne of Blood, Yojimbo) and Eiji Okada (Hiroshima Mon Amour, Woman in the Dunes), appearing alongside an estimated 90,000 residents from the city as extras, including many survivors from that fateful day on 6th August 1945. Hiroshima was produced and distributed outside of the studio system by the Japan Teachers' Union following the mixed critical reception to Children of Hiroshima (1952), directed by Kaneto Shindo the previous year, the first dramatic feature to deal directly with the atomic bombing. Although sequences from the film were used in Alain Resnais' classic of French New Wave cinema, Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959), it has been effectively out of circulation in Japan and the rest of the world since its original release in 1953 due to the force and political sensitivity of its message. This new High Definition presentation is the complete version, restoring the footage from the international edit that was released in the United States in 1955. SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS High Definition Blu-ray™ (1080p) presentation Original uncompressed audio Archive interview with actress Yumeji Tsukioka Hiroshima Nagasaki Download (2011), 73-minute documentary featuring interviews with survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings now residing in the United States, with an introduction by the director Shinpei Takeda New video essay by Jasper Sharp Newly commissioned artwork by Scott Saslow FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Collector's booklet featuring new writing on the film by Mick Broderick

• Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) (Criterion Collection) UK Only | Blu Ray | (03/01/2022) from £17.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A cornerstone of the French New Wave, the first feature from ALAIN RESNAIS (Last Year at Marienbad) is one of the most influential films of all time. A French actress (Amour's EMMANUELLE RIVA) and a Japanese architect (Woman in the Dunes' EIJI OKADA) engage in a brief, intense affair in postwar Hiroshima, their consuming mutual fascination impelling them to exorcise their own scarred memories of love and suffering. With an innovative flashback structure and an Academy Awardnominated screenplay by novelist MARGUERITE DURAS (India Song), Hiroshima mon amour is a moody masterwork that delicately weaves past and present, personal pain and public anguish. Special Features New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack Audio commentary by film historian Peter Cowie Interviews with director Alain Resnais from 1961 and 1980 Interviews with actor Emmanuelle Riva from 1959 and 2003 New interview with film scholar François Thomas, author of L'atelier d'Alain Resnais New interview with music scholar Tim Page about the film's score Revoir Hiroshima . . . , a 2013 program about the film's restoration New English subtitle translation PLUS: An essay by critic Kent Jones and excerpts from a 1959 Cahiers du cinéma roundtable discussion about the film

• Woman Of The Dunes | DVD | (31/07/2006) from £6.99   |  Saving you £13.00 (185.98%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Hiroshi Teshigahara's powerful masterpiece based on the novel by Kobo Abe follows an amateur biologist who escapes the bustle of the city by studying beetles in remote sand dunes. After missing the last bus he accepts a villager's offer to spend the night in a widow's shack at the bottom of a deep sand pit. In the morning he finds he is trapped. At first enraged the man's hatred for the woman soon turns to searing erotic lust.

• Assassination | DVD | (23/01/2006) from £27.37   |  Saving you £-7.38 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Assassination (or Ansatsu) marked Masahiro Shinoda's first attempt at a period film and is widely considered to be his finest achievement. Previously gaining fame and status alongside Nagisa Oshima and Kiju Yoshida challenging established Japanese cinema with tales of reckless youth The Dry Lake (1960) and the seminal yakuza drama Pale Flower (1964) Shinoda graduated from Shochiku where like Shohei Imamura his grounding wa

• Hiroshima Mon Amour | DVD | (25/07/2011) from £17.53   |  Saving you £-1.54 (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Alain Resnais' groundbreaking first feature Hiroshima Mon Amour was a springboard for the French New Wave movement and its influence continues to this day. A nameless French actress (Emmanuelle Riva) and Japanese architect (Eiji Okada) engage in a brief passionate affair in post-war Hiroshima. Their deeply intense connection brings out scarred memories of love and suffering which Resnais' communicates with the use of flashback techniques innovative to that time.

• Marlon Brando Box Set | DVD | (22/11/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £35.99

  A collection of classic and unusual Marlon Brando movies including The Wild One One The Waterfront The Ugly American and The Appaloosa. The Wild One (1954) An angry young Marlon Brando scorches the screen as The Wild One in this powerful 50s cult classic. Brando plays Johnny the leader of a vicious biker gang that involves a small sleepy California town. The leather-jacketed young biker seems hell-bent on destruction until he falls for Kathie (Mary Murphy) a 'good-girl' w

• Hiroshima Mon Amour | DVD | (28/02/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Alain Resnais' truly amazing debut feature digitally remastered from the restored print! This powerful and moving love story is set in the late fifties and involves a French film actress (Emanuelle Riva) and a Japanese architect (Eiji Okada) who embark on a brief affair in Hiroshima. The intimacy of the encounter makes them reflect on the painful history of the city and the tragedy and humiliation that befell her during a disastrous affair with a German soldier in her home town in wa

• Hiroshima Mon Amour | Blu Ray | (18/01/2016) from £31.03   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  An extraordinary and deeply moving film that retains much of its power since its original release in 1959, Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour is the story of a French woman (Emmanuelle Riva) and a Japanese man (Eiji Okada) who become lovers in the city of Hiroshima, where the US dropped a nuclear bomb to end World War Two in the Pacific. Written by Marguerite Duras and juggled, as if by wandering thoughts, in chronology and setting by Resnais, the film reveals the miserable and mortifying experiences of each character during the war and suggests the obvious healing properties of their relationship in the present. An emotional allusion or two can certainly be made with the more recent The English Patient, but nothing can quite prepare one for Resnais's extreme yet intuitively accessible experiments in fusing the past, present and future into great sweeps of subjectively experienced memory. Yet audiences have never had trouble relating to this bold milestone of the French New Wave, largely because at its heart is a genuinely affecting, soulful love story. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com

• Zatoichi At The Blood Fest | DVD | (02/02/2003) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The endless travels of the blind swordsman have unexpectedly led him back to the town of Kasama. A chance meeting with a girl Omiyo stirs up memories when Zatoichi learns that they were both raised by the same woman. He is invited to stay with Omiyo and her grandfather Sakubei who remembers Zatoichi as a boy. Zatoichi's arrival has coincided with a ""welcome home"" feast for Shinbei his childhood friend. Shinbei has returned home a successful businessman and pays the town's taxes w

• Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis - Steelbook Edition | Blu Ray | (30/10/2018) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Ozu - Vol 4 | DVD | (29/01/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Late Autumn (aka: Akibiyori): Ayako Miwa (Yoko Tsukasa) gives up thoughts of marriage in order to care for her widowed mother Akiko (Setsuko Hara). However Akiko wishes her daughter to marry even though she will be left alone into old age and when the well-meaning relatives of her deceased husband step into the fray suitors are simultaneously sought for both generations of the Miwa family! An Autumn Afternoon (aka: Sanma No Aji): Widower Shuhei Hirayama (Chishu Ryu) gradually comes to realize that his 24 year-old daughter should not be obliged to look after him for the rest of his life and so prepares to arrange a marriage for her.

• Hiroshima Mon Amour | DVD | (18/01/2016) from £24.28   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  An extraordinary and deeply moving film that retains much of its power since its original release in 1959, Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour is the story of a French woman (Emmanuelle Riva) and a Japanese man (Eiji Okada) who become lovers in the city of Hiroshima, where the US dropped a nuclear bomb to end World War Two in the Pacific. Written by Marguerite Duras and juggled, as if by wandering thoughts, in chronology and setting by Resnais, the film reveals the miserable and mortifying experiences of each character during the war and suggests the obvious healing properties of their relationship in the present. An emotional allusion or two can certainly be made with the more recent The English Patient, but nothing can quite prepare one for Resnais's extreme yet intuitively accessible experiments in fusing the past, present and future into great sweeps of subjectively experienced memory. Yet audiences have never had trouble relating to this bold milestone of the French New Wave, largely because at its heart is a genuinely affecting, soulful love story. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com