The Men Who Tread on the Tiger's Tail

A murdered mother and daughter return from the dead as vampiric cat spirits intent on revenge, in Kaneto Shindô's companion piece to Onibaba.

Akira Kurosawa’s thrilling mix of fairy story and samurai movie - a story of rival clans, hidden gold and a princess in distress - was famously a key inspiration for George Lucas’ Star Wars.

Kurosawa’s classic about a drifting samurai who plays two gangs off against each other, famously remade as A Fistful of Dollars.

A master of period-drama, Kurosawa (Rashomon, Seven Samurai) recasts Macbeth as a Japanese warlord in one of the greatest Shakespearean adaptations.

Akira Kurosawa’s first colour film is an eccentric and joyous account of a group of disparate people living in a city dump.

Takashi Shimura is superb as a bureaucrat diagnosed with cancer in Akira Kurosawa’s lyrical and moving film about how we find meaning in our lives.

Akira Kurosawa’s thrilling mix of fairy story and samurai movie - a story of rival clans, hidden gold and a princess in distress - was famously a key inspiration for George Lucas’ Star Wars.

Akira Kurosawa’s procedural crime masterpiece, from Ed McBain’s gritty novel, follows an industrialist who faces an agonising choice as a result of a botched kidnapping by ruthless criminals.

The first film made by Akira Kurosawa's own production company is a dark tale of greed, corporate corruption and revenge.

This sequel reunites most of the principal cast from the original and follows Sanshiro face a new set of enemies whilst continuing his quest to become a judo master.

Kurosawa's first post-war film stars Setsuko Hara as the privileged daughter of a professor who takes up arms against the Japanese military.

Kurosawa’s assured debut film about a young man’s spiritual journey through the study and practice of judo.

This sequel reunites most of the principal cast from the original and follows Sanshiro face a new set of enemies whilst continuing his quest to become a judo master.

Kurosawa's first post-war film stars Setsuko Hara as the privileged daughter of a professor who takes up arms against the Japanese military.

Kurosawa’s assured debut film about a young man’s spiritual journey through the study and practice of judo.

A master of period-drama, Kurosawa (Rashomon, Seven Samurai) recasts Macbeth as a Japanese warlord in one of the greatest Shakespearean adaptations.

Kurosawa’s episodic, poignant story of a 19th-century doctor (Toshiro Mifune) working in a clinic for the poor and his tumultuous friendship with young intern.

Takashi Shimura is superb as a bureaucrat diagnosed with cancer in Akira Kurosawa’s lyrical and moving film about how we find meaning in our lives.

Akira Kurosawa’s thrilling mix of fairy story and samurai movie - a story of rival clans, hidden gold and a princess in distress - was famously a key inspiration for George Lucas’ Star Wars.

Toshiro Mifune delivers an outstanding performance as a paranoid man striving to move his family to Brazil to escape the nuclear holocaust which he fears is imminent.

Akira Kurosawa’s artful propaganda film provides a fascinating portrait of female volunteer workers in an optics factory during wartime.

A young man with Down's syndrome is forced into care after his mother dies, in this sensitive, poignant and naturalistic drama.

In her final film, Agnès Varda offers a personal insight into her oeuvre, using excerpts from her work to illustrate her unique artistic visions and ideas.

Karel Zeman's astonishing fantasy mixes live-action and animation to tell the adventures of a ploughman and a mercenery during the Thirty Years War.

Karel Zeman’s wildly inventive and comic take on the surreal adventures of the bragging Baron explodes on to the screen in a riot of colour, visual wit and poetic verve.

A beautiful and contemplative portrait of grief from Cannes-winning filmmaker Naomi Kawase (Sweet Bean, Still the Water).

The living and the dead coexist in Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cannes-winning meditation on love and loss.