2 Best Movies to Watch by Takamitsu Nonaka

Hirokazu Koreeda can do no wrong. The director of Shoplifters and Still Walking is a master of dissecting complex family dynamics through a handful of events. In Our Little Sister, three close sisters who live at their grandmother's house learn that their absent father has passed. They travel to the mountains to attend his funeral and meet their half-sister, Suzu, for the first time. Suzu is invited to live with the sisters and join their bond. This movie is a true-to-the-form slice of life, it's almost drama-free. This absence of plot is an absence of distractions: the sisters are all that matters to Koreeda. His only focus is on how this family becomes bigger, sees past grief, and how the group of close-knit sisters that grew up together can make room for a new addition.

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Family

Actor: Fukiko Hara, Haruka Ayase, Ichirō Ogura, Ikeda Takafumi, Jun Fubuki, Kaho, Kaoru Hirata, Kentaro Sakaguchi, Kirin Kiki, Lily Franky, Maeda Oushirou, Masami Nagasawa, Masumi Nomura, Midoriko Kimura, Mikami Saya, Oshiro Maeda, Ryō Kase, Ryohei Suzuki, Shinichi Tsutsumi, Shinobu Otake, Suzu Hirose, Takamitsu Nonaka, Yuko Nakamura, 中春优子

Director: Hirokazu Kore-eda, Hirokazu Koreeda

Rating: PG

Borrowing heavily from yakuza films of the past, The Blood of Wolves feels like a movie plucked straight out of the 1970s and given a slick coat of 2010s neo-noir shine. The film never tries to reinvent the recipe it's working with, but it doesn't have to when its violence is still satisfyingly brutal, its plot endlessly twisty, and its morality grey. At the center is a brash and sleazy performance from the great Koji Yakusho, whom you can never really clock as being in control or out of his depth. It might only hold special value for hardcore fans of the genre, but it provides enough solid thrills for the more casual viewer.

Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller

Actor: Abe Junko, Eiji Takigawa, Gorō Ibuki, Hajime Inoue, Issei Okihara, Joey Iwanaga, Junko Abe, Katsuya, Ken'ichi Yajima, Kenichi Takito, Kenichi Takitoh, Kōji Yakusho, Kyūsaku Shimada, Marie Machida, Megumi, Pierre Taki, Renji Ishibashi, Ryuji Sainei, Shidô Nakamura, Shun Nakayama, Takahiro Kuroishi, Takaki Uda, Takamitsu Nonaka, Taketo Tanaka, Takuma Otoo, Taro Suruga, Tomorowo Taguchi, Tomoya Nakamura, Tori Matsuzaka, Yôko Maki, Yosuke Eguchi, Yutaka Takenouchi

Director: Kazuya Shiraishi