"Actor: Miyuki Kuwano"

• The Shape of Night | Blu Ray | (24/03/2025) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A young woman from the countryside (Miyuki Kuwano of Oshima's Cruel Story of Youth) falls in love with a handsome hoodlum (Mikijiro Hira, Sword of the Beast), who pushes her into a life of prostitution. When his sleazy superiors catch sight of her, she finds herself trapped inside the gaudy maze of city nightlife. Directed by Noburo Nakamura, a veteran of the Shochiku studio's signature Golden Age family dramas, The Shape of Night was made as a reaction to the radical film styles of the Japanese New Wave. With its lush cinematography full of saturated colours, a lyrical tone and its story of love leading to inescapable tragedy, it has been compared to the films of Douglas Sirk, while also acting as a precursor to the work of Wong Kar-wai.★★★★★ a lyrical, nearly Wong-kar Wai-like counterpart to ardent work by Oshima or Imamura Film Commentkept me continually gripped and often surprised David BordwellThe camera angles and movements, the colour scheme and editing all work brilliantly to illustrate her constant sacrifice and lead us to emotionally internalise the gaudy city as a dazzling parade that always leads her back to her situation. Stylistically the film anticipates the Wong Kar-wai of In the Mood for Love and echoes Douglas Sirk at his most stirring. Nick James, Sight and Sound

• Cruel Story of Youth (1960) | Blu Ray | (17/08/2015) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Eureka Entertainment to release Japanese Director Nagisa Oshima’s landmark film CRUEL STORY OF YOUTH a shocking tale of youthful delinquency in post-Hiroshima Japan on Blu-ray for the first time in the UK in a Dual Format edition available from 17 August 2015. This second feature by the Japanese cinema-insurgent Nagisa Ôshima (In the Realm of the Senses Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence) galvanised its home-turf with its topsy-turvy directorial dexterity and stinging castigation of an indolent self-indulgent youth culture reposing on the eve of the turbulent 1960s. When high-schooler Makoto is saved from the advances of a lecherous middle-aged man by uni student Kiyoshi the pair embark on a fits-and-starts affair that finally settles into a sexually extortionary mutually exploitative dependency that promises to spell their relationship’s doom. Ôshima’s breakthrough portrait of alienated youth comes courtesy of the 2014 Shochiku 4K scan that resurrected the film’s glorious colour palette recently described by critic and programmer James Quandt as “running riot with retro: pulsing neon turquoise telephones hair teased into shellacked grandeur.” The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Cruel Story of Youth in a Dual Format edition for the first time on Blu-ray in the UK. Feature: Gorgeous 1080p presentation of the film on Blu-ray from the 2014 4K Shochiku restoration Optional English subtitles New video interview with film critic Tony Rayns Original theatrical trailer 36-page booklet containing an essay interview material and rare archival imagery

• The Shape of Night (Limited Edition) | Blu Ray | (29/04/2024) from £17.99   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

  A young woman from the countryside (Miyuki Kuwano of Oshima's Cruel Story of Youth) falls in love with a handsome hoodlum (Mikijiro Hira, Sword of the Beast), who pushes her into a life of prostitution. When his sleazy superiors catch sight of her, she finds herself trapped inside the gaudy maze of city nightlife. Directed by Noburo Nakamura, a veteran of the Shochiku studio's signature Golden Age family dramas, The Shape of Night was made as a reaction to the radical film styles of the Japanese New Wave. With its lush cinematography full of saturated colours, a lyrical tone and its story of love leading to inescapable tragedy, it has been compared to the films of Douglas Sirk, while also acting as a precursor to the work of Wong Kar-wai.★★★★★ 'a lyrical, nearly Wong-kar Wai-like counterpart to ardent work by Oshima or Imamura' - Film Comment'kept me continually gripped and often surprised' - David Bordwell'The camera angles and movements, the colour scheme and editing all work brilliantly to illustrate her constant sacrifice and lead us to emotionally internalise the gaudy city as a dazzling parade that always leads her back to her situation. Stylistically the film anticipates the Wong Kar-wai of In the Mood for Love and echoes Douglas Sirk at his most stirring.' - Nick James, Sight and SoundProduct FeaturesLIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES:High-Definition digital transferUncompressed mono PCM audioVisual essay on the artistic upheavals at Shochiku studios during the 1960s by Tom MesNew and improved English subtitle translationReversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time TomorrowLimited edition booklet featuring new writing by Chuck Stephens Limited edition of 3000 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markingsMore to be confirmed!

• Red Beard | DVD | (06/10/2003) from £18.75   |  Saving you £1.24 (6.61%)   |  RRP £19.99

  The last and most ambitious of Akira Kurosawa's collaborations with Toshiro Mifune Red Beard marked the end of one of the most remarkable actor-director relationships in the history of cinema. Toshiro Mifune plays a commanding but humane doctor in a rural clinic in late 19th-century Japan. An idle and socially ambitious intern (Yuzo Kayama) arrives at the clinic and discovers the meaning of responsibility first to oneself and then to others. This intimate epic - a

• Night And Fog In Japan | DVD | (23/06/2008) from £6.59   |  Saving you £13.40 (203.34%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Nagisa Oshima's most personal film is a reflection by the director on his own disillusionment with the revolutionary student movement of the 1950's and the failure of political radicalism. Taking it's title (as a reference or homage) from Alain Resnais' pivotal 1956 documentary Night and Fog the film has a group of former student revolutionaries who meet again years later at the wedding of one of their classmates. Old feelings rivalaries and grudges gradually erupt to the surface as the one-time friends recall the various treacheries by which their cause was defeated. Cutting between times past and the present and unfolding the action from each of his characters viewpoints Oshima creates an abstract and yet engrossing study of passions past and principles eroded. Controversial upon release - the film's producers pulled the film from distribution after only a few days in cinemas - Night & Fog in Japan retains both its power to shock and its ability to engage the viewer in it's radical form and themes.

• Naked Youth | DVD | (25/02/2008) from £11.48   |  Saving you £10.50 (110.64%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Oshima's second feature is a shocking tale of youthful delinquency in post Hiroshima japan. Conveying the pent up sexuality and disillusionment among Japan's post war generation it tells the story of teenage lovers Makato and Kiyoshi. She's a good girl gone bad dropping out of school and out of home; he's a violent hoodlum gambler and hustler. Making a living by performing shakedowns and attempting blackmail on unsuspecting middle aged men the film affords a bleak nihilistic take to the 'taiyo-zako' (Japanese cinema's 'delinquent youth' films). Often billed as Japan's Rebel Without A Cause but whereas Jame Dean's Jim Stark had the proverbial heart of gold Kawazu's Kiyoshi is filled only with rage and disgust. All of life's harsh realities await Makoto and Kiyoshi - this is no morality lesson or cautionary tale just a window into a terrible vision of humanity.

• 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.