6 Movies Starring Masahiro Motoki

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Yet another tradition in the tradition of "ragtag misfits" in Japanese comedy...Sumo Do, Sumo Don't tells the story of a university sumo club in Japan. In today's Japan, the younger generation is more interested in "Western" sports like baseball and basketball. Professor Anayama, a former university sumo champion, blackmails graduating (and slim) student Shuhei into joining the decimated university team, or he doesn't graduate. Along with a pro wrestler, an unpopular, chubby guy, and a gaijin (white guy), the team begins training for competition, even though none of them cares about sumo at all. Gradually, they develop a love and respect for the traditional sport.

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Edogawa Rampo is a writer whose latest work is censored by the government, deemed too disturbing and injurious to the public to be allowed to be published. However, after burning his drafts, his publisher shows him a newspaper with an account of events just like his forbidden story. As the film progresses, fantasy and reality intermingle in a tale that draws heavily on influences from Poe and Stoker's Dracula. The film's strongly Expressionistic direction skillfully combines a variety of media (animation, computer-generated imagery, grainy black-and-white fast film stock, color negatives) for artistic effect.

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Five men plot to steal a large sum of money from the local yakuza, but everything does not go as planned and the men find themselves hunted down by contract killers.

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A young Japanese salaryman is sent by his company to a remote Chinese village to evaluate precious Jade that is found there, but before he arrives meets the yakuza who was sent to tail him to protect his bosses interest in the company. When the men finally arrive their mission become sidetracked by their interest in a mysterious young village girl, her haunting English language song and the secret that makes men fly like birds.

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Yukio is living a charmed life: he is a respected young doctor with a successful practice and a beautiful wife. His only problem is that his wife is suffering from amnesia, and her past is unknown. Things begin to fall apart, however, when both his parents die suddenly, killed by a mysterious stranger with Yukio's face. Only when Yukio confronts this stranger will the mystery of his identity, and his wife's past, be revealed.

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Daigo Kobayashi is a devoted cellist in an orchestra that has just been dissolved and now finds himself without a job. Daigo decides to move back to his old hometown with his wife to look for work and start over. He answers a classified ad entitled "Departures" thinking it is an advertisement for a travel agency only to discover that the job is actually for a "Nokanshi" or "encoffineer," a funeral professional who prepares deceased bodies for burial and entry into the next life. While his wife and others despise the job, Daigo takes a certain pride in his work and begins to perfect the art of "Nokanshi," acting as a gentle gatekeeper between life and death, between the departed and the family of the departed. The film follows his profound and sometimes comical journey with death as he uncovers the wonder, joy and meaning of life and living.