All Recommendations
Onibaba
While her son, Kichi, is away at war, a woman and her daughter-in-law survive by killing samurai who stray into their swamp, then selling whatever valuables they find. Both are devastated when they learn that Kichi has died, but his wife soon begins an affair with a neighbor who survived the war, Hachi. The mother disapproves and, when she can't steal Hachi for herself, tries to scare her daughter-in-law with a mysterious mask from a dead samurai.
Youth of the Beast
When a mysterious stranger muscles into two rival yakuza gangs, Tokyo's underworld explodes with violence.
Varda by Agnès
An unpredictable documentary from a fascinating storyteller, Agnès Varda’s last film sheds light on her experience as a director, bringing a personal insight to what she calls "cine-writing," traveling from Rue Daguerre in Paris to Los Angeles and Beijing.
Vital
A young man awakens in the hospital after an accident wipes his memory. Fascinated by a textbook full of drawings of dissections, Hiroshi is drawn to a medical school where he catches the eye of a fellow student. But it's another who becomes his obsession. the dead woman on the cadaver table.
The Idiot
Kameda, who has been in an asylum on Okinawa, travels to Hokkaido. There he becomes involved with two women, Taeko and Ayako. Taeko comes to love Kameda, but is loved in turn by Akama. When Akama realizes that he will never have Taeko, his thoughts turn to murder, and great tragedy ensues.
I Am Twenty
Having returned from the army, 20-year-old Sergei settles down at the thermal power station and merges into ordinary life. Every day he meets and spends time with childhood friends — the young family man Slava and the merry fellow Nikolai, and once at first sight he falls in love with a stranger on the bus. A lyrical story about a generation of young people entering adulthood, a reappraisal of values, life principles, traditions in culture and art.
Way Down East
A naive country girl is tricked into a sham marriage by a wealthy womanizer, then must rebuild her life despite the taint of having borne a child out of wedlock.
Massacre Time
In 1866, prospector Tom Corbett returns to his hometown of Laramie, Texas, now under the brutal control of gangster Jason Scott and his violent son, Junior. With his brother Jeff, a struggling drunk cared for by their maid Mercedes, Tom seeks to overthrow the Scotts' tyrannical rule and restore peace to the town.
The Great Kidnapping
In early seventies Italy, plagued by criminality and political terrorism, a fearless police commissioner is sent to restore law and order in a northern industrial town devastated by a recent wave of violence and kidnappings..
Detective Bureau 2-3: Go to Hell, Bastards!
Tajima is a private detective in charge of his own company, Detective Bureau 2-3. When warring criminal gangs go overboard by robbing U.S. military munitions, Tajima steps in to stop what the cops can't.
Venus
During casting sessions, young women from Copenhagen talk candidly about their sexual experiences. Initially, the two female directors wanted to make a film as a way of better understanding their own sexual desires and frustrations. In response to a casting call, more than a hundred ordinary young women turned up and talked straight into the camera about their erotic fantasies. As shooting progressed, the filmmakers realized that these intimate casting sessions should in fact be the final film.
Story of a Prostitute
Volunteering as a "comfort woman" on the Manchurian front, where she is expected to service hundreds of soldiers, Harumi is commandeered by the brutal Lieutenant Narita but falls for the sensitive Mikami, Narita's direct subordinate. Seijun Suzuki's Story of a Prostitute is a tragic love story as well as a rule-bending take on a popular Taijiro Tamura novel, challenging military and fraternal codes of honor, as seen through Harumi's eyes.
Frieda
An RAF pilot who was shot down during WWII returns home to his English village with his new bride. The trouble is that she is the German lady who helped him escape.
Kagero-za
A 1920s playwright meets a beautiful woman who may be the ghost of his patron's deceased wife.
Carne
After a dreadful incident coupled with an ungovernable paroxysm of violence, a butcher will fall into a downward spiral that will burn to the ground whatever dignity still remained in him.
Lady Snowblood
Yuki's family is nearly wiped out before she is born due to the machinations of a band of criminals. These criminals kidnap and brutalize her mother but leave her alive. Later her mother ends up in prison with only revenge to keep her alive. She creates an instrument for this revenge by purposefully getting pregnant. Yuki never knows the love of a family but only killing and revenge.
Happiness
A young husband and father, perfectly content with his life, falls in love with another woman.
The Novice
A college freshman joins her university's rowing team and undertakes an obsessive physical and psychological journey to make it to the top varsity boat, no matter the cost.
Black Narcissus
A group of Anglican nuns, led by Sister Clodagh, are sent to a mountain in the Himalayas. The climate in the region is hostile and the nuns are housed in an odd old palace. They work to establish a school and a hospital, but slowly their focus shifts. Sister Ruth falls for a government worker, Mr. Dean, and begins to question her vow of celibacy. As Sister Ruth obsesses over Mr. Dean, Sister Clodagh becomes immersed in her own memories of love.
Thunder Road
A police officer faces a personal meltdown following a divorce and the death of his mother.