Tetsuo Satonaka

Oyaji

Surrounded by violence for as long as he can remember, Ryoudo Numata has steeled himself into a tremendously tough man, growing to become the very essence of "manliness" himself in order to live his life in peace. When members of a yakuza clan set on fire to his house to facilitate a real estate transaction, Kumada murders them and gets jailed for it. 15 years later, finally free, he will now have to reconnect with his family who clearly are in disarray due his long absence and face the distrust of his children who know nothing of their father except that he had abandoned them.

Osaka Story

Young Wakana is the daughter of a husband and wife comedy act, who have worked together for 20 years without any big success. Wakana’s parents quarrel constantly, and her mother often threatens to leave. When one day her father disappears, Wakana sets out to find him.

Tokyo Lullaby

Hamanaka Koichi returns to his wife Hisako and family in a sadder, run-down section of eastern Tokyo after having run away from home years before. He gives no explanation of his absence and his family asks no questions. It is only through the questions that a young writer named Asakura, who is secretly in love with Hisako, poses of local shop owners, that we learn that Hamanaka's disappearance may be related to the fact that the woman everyone thought he would marry, Tami - who runs the cafe across the street from the Hamanaka electric store - had ended up tying the knot with another man who died soon thereafter.

Tokiwa: The Manga Apartment

There still stands a famous apartment building where such prominent manga artists as Tezuka Osamu, Shotaro Ishinomori and Fujio Akatsuka once lived, worked, and shared experiences.

Dying at a Hospital

Filmed in a documentary style, six patients in six wards of different ages and circumstances await death at a hospital in Japan. The sterile and dismal environment is contrasted against the emotional being of the patients, their visitors and relatives and the outside world, which they will never again survey.