By Anton Bitel
Crazy Thunder Road, director Sogo Ishii’s explosive anti-establishment thriller, is dedicated “to all crazy bikers”.
A teenage girl finds online fame in Mamoru Hosoda’s internet-age update of Beauty and the Beast.
By Anton Bitel
Tezuka’s Barbara is a meta ode to the director’s late father, the ‘godfather’ of the Japanese graphic novel.
LeSean Thomas’ six-part animated series is an electrifying vision of a long-ignored legend.
Media, memory and film history collide in Satoshi Kon’s time-bending story of a faded screen star.
By Anton Bitel
House of Bamboo, one of the first American features to be shot in Japan, is as hard-boiled as they come.
Ryûhei Kitamura’s frenetic, crazily-ambitious cult favourite is low-brow filmmaking at its mind-boggling best.
By Anton Bitel
Godzilla creator Ishiro Honda’s globe-trotting adventure is a strangely sweet family adventure.
A copyright dispute around 1984’s ‘Sherlock Hound’ freed the Japanese animator to establish Studio Ghibli.
With his yakuza thriller Boiling Point, “Beat” Takeshi staked his claim as a serious filmmaker.
By Anton Bitel
Kinji Fukasaku’s Graveyard of Honor and Takashi Miike’s 2002 update redefined the postwar Japanese gangster flick.
The ’90s straight-to-video boom reinvigorated the industry and made stars of directors like Takashi Miike.
By Leigh Singer
Our latest Remake/Remodel video essay analyses the impact of Akira Kurosawa’s samurai epic on Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti western.
The anime master behind Paprika and Perfect Blue left behind several incomplete projects which could still be realised.
The first and only film from Miyazaki protégé Yoshifumi Kondo stands among the studio’s best works.
Hausu director Nobuhiko Obayashi’s penultimate film, Hanagatami, is as surreal as it is moving.
In 1972’s Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion, Meiko Kaji emerged as a bona fide, badass star.