The best Kinuyo Tanaka’s movies
We present our ranking of the best Kinuyo Tanaka’s movies. Do you love cinema? Or are you looking for a movie of your favorite actor to watch tonight? Surely you have some to see or that you did not know yet about Kinuyo Tanaka.
The Ballad of Narayama
7.8/10
In Kabuki style, the film tells the story of a remote mountain village where the scarcity of food leads to a voluntary but socially-enforced policy in which relatives carry 70-year-old family members up Narayama mountain to die. Granny Orin is approaching 70, content to embrace her fate. Her widowed son Tatsuhei cannot bear losing his mother, even as she arranges his marriage to a widow his age. Her grandson Kesa, who's girlfriend is pregnant, is selfishly happy to see Orin die. Around them, a family of thieves are dealt with severely, and an old man, past 70, whose son has cast him out, scrounges for food. Will Orin's loving and accepting spirit teach and ennoble her family?
Equinox Flower
7.8/10
Later in his career, Ozu started becoming increasingly sympathetic with the younger generation, a shift that was cemented in Equinox Flower, his gorgeously detailed first color film, about an old-fashioned father and his newfangled daughter.
Ugetsu
8.2/10
In 16th century Japan, peasants Genjuro and Tobei sell their earthenware pots to a group of soldiers in a nearby village, in defiance of a local sage's warning against seeking to profit from warfare. Genjuro's pursuit of both riches and the mysterious Lady Wakasa, as well as Tobei's desire to become a samurai, run the risk of destroying both themselves and their wives, Miyagi and Ohama.
Red Beard
8.3/10
Aspiring to an easy job as personal physician to a wealthy family, Noboru Yasumoto is disappointed when his first post after medical school takes him to a small country clinic under the gruff doctor Red Beard. Yasumoto rebels in numerous ways, but Red Beard proves a wise and patient teacher. He gradually introduces his student to the unglamorous side of the profession, ultimately assigning him to care for a prostitute rescued from a local brothel.
Sansho the Bailiff
8.4/10
In medieval Japan a compassionate governor is sent into exile. His wife and children try to join him, but are separated, and the children grow up amid suffering and oppression.
Sandakan No. 8
7.5/10
A young journalist interviews an elderly woman about being forced into prostitution in Borneo at a brothel called Sandakan No. 8.
The Life of Oharu
8.1/10
Follows a woman's fight and survival amid the vicissitudes of life and the cruelty of the society.
Ornamental Hairpin
7.1/10
Emi Ota and her friend Okiku stay briefly at a mountain inn and then return to Tokyo. Later, Nanmura, a soldier on leave, steps on an ornamental hairpin in the public bath at the inn. Emi writes to the inn saying she has lost a hairpin and, when she discovers that it injured Nanmura, returns to apologize. The longer term visitors at the inn meet together to discuss the hairpin incident. These include a grumpy Professor, a young couple Mr and Mrs Hiroyasu, and an old man staying with his two grandsons. They hope to see a romance blossom between Nanmura and Emi, after Nanmura declares that there is something almost poetic in finding a hairpin in the bath.
Mother
7.6/10
A teenaged girl witnesses her widowed mother's attempt to sustain her family.
Women of the Night
7.2/10
Fusako, a drug dealer's young mistress in postwar Japan, loses her tenuous grasp on life upon learning about her lover's affair.
Yotsuya Ghost Story Part 1
6.9/10
Iemon Tamiya is an impoverished masterless samurai who craves a better life, which he cannot have because of his marriage to Oiwa, who is completely devoted to her husband.
The Munekata Sisters
7.4/10
Setsuko is unhappily to Mimura, an engineer with no job and a bad drinking habit. She had always been in love with Hiroshi but both of them failed to propose when Hiroshi left for France a few years ago. Now he is back and Mariko (Setsuko's sister) tries to reunite them. She too is secretly in love with Hiroshi.
Love Letter
7.2/10
A sad and troubled man finds a new job five years after the end of WWII, where he writes love letters for other people.
Dragnet Girl
7/10
A gangster tries to find redemption with the inadvertent help of an innocent shop girl and his jealous girlfriend will do anything to keep him.
Where Now Are the Dreams of Youth?
6.9/10
When a young man inherits his father's lucrative business, he cheats the system to set up three of his college friends with jobs.
A Hen in the Wind
7.4/10
Tokiko is a mother patiently waiting for her husband's return from the war when her 4-year old son becomes ill. She takes him to the doctor for treatment but has no way of paying. She resorts to prostitution. One month later her husband returns from WWII to find his desperate wife, who tells him the truth. Together they must deal with the consequences.
The Moon Has Risen
7.2/10
Mokichi is the widowed father of three daughters, with whom he lives on the premises of a temple since the war. In the film all three daughters become involved in some sort of complicated relationships. The sisters and their attached Men are deliberately designed as allegorical figures on the changing social conditions. A wonderfully funny, sometimes droll comedy between Nara and Tokyo, Adagio and Allegro, Yesterday and Today - in search of a morning.
Army
6.5/10
A widow raises her sickly son to be strong enough to join the army and fight on the front lines.
Miss Oyu
7.4/10
Shinnosuke is introduced to Shizu as a prospective marriage partner, but he falls in love with her widowed sister Oyu. Convention forbids Oyu to marry because she has to raise her son as the head of her husband's family. Oyu convinces Shinnosuke and Shizu to marry so that she can remain close to Shinnosuke.
Woman of Rumor
7.4/10
Yukiko's fiance learns her mother runs a geisha house and ends their engagement. She despises what her mother does until one of her clients shows interest and starts to woo her.
