Best movies like Why Not?
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
The film depicts carnivalesque atmosphere summed up by the cry "Ee ja nai ka" ("Why not?") in Japan in 1867 and 1868 in the days leading to the Meiji Restoration. It examines the effects of the political and social upheaval of the time, and culminates in a revelrous march on the Kokyo, which turns into a massacre. Characteristically, Imamura focuses not on the leaders of the country, but on characters in the lower classes and on the fringes of society.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 681
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 151 min
Plot tags: clever, serious, realistic, witty, cynical, bilingual
Best tv shows and movies like Why Not? (1981):
Similar in 86%
Inn of Evil (1971)
Plot Summary:
The story takes place in feudal Japan, when any commerce with the rest of the world was strictly prohibited. An idealist suddenly appears in an isolated inn (the one that the title refers to), the head-quarters of a group of smugglers, with stolen money intended to ransom his loved one who is forced to work in a brothel.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 121 min
Plot tags: jidai geki
Similar in 83%
Assassination (1964)
Plot Summary:
Assassination begins with the events of 1853 when "four black ships" anchored at Edo Bay, sparking civil unrest and the major political manoeuvring that saw the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate. At a time when assassination had become a disturbing political tool, Shinoda's film follows Hachiro Kiyokawa (Tetsuro Tamba), an ambitious, masterless samurai whose allegiances drift dangerously between the Shogunate and the Emperor.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 956
Genere: Action, Crime, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags:
Similar in 83%
The Night (2014)
Plot Summary:
A young man stands in front of a mirror. The night belongs to him. Every evening, he appraises his appearance, attired in a new shirt, leaves his apartment and waits in a poorly lit alleyway for his johns. One night he meets a female prostitute of his age who’s new in this part of town.
IMDB Rating: 6.1
IMDB Votes: 77
Genere: Drama
Country: China
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: realistic, touching, serious, suspense, queer cinema
Similar in 79%
The Insect Woman (1963)
Plot Summary:
A woman, Tome, is born to a lower class family in Japan in 1918. The title refers to an insect, repeating its mistakes, as in an infinite circle. Imamura, with this metaphor, introduces the life of Tome, who keeps trying to change her poor life.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 123 min
Plot tags: freeze frame, semi documentary, clever, serious, realistic, witty, cynical, biting, avant garde, suspense
Similar in 82%
Hana (2006)
Plot Summary:
In a poor district of Edo lives a young samurai named Soza. He has been sent by his clan to avenge the death of his father. He isn't an accomplished swordsman however, and he prefers sharing the life of the residents, teaching the kids how to write etc. When he finally finds the man he is looking for, he will have to decide whether he follows the way of the samurai or chooses peace and reconciliation.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 127 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, serious, captivating, humorous
Similar in 83%
God Is on Air (2002)
Plot Summary:
Two Spanish pan-handlers soon find themselves in over their heads when they stumble upon an opportunity to redeem themselves and perhaps the entire planet. The world appears to suffer from rampant poverty, violence and spiritual desperation and the relentless news media force-feeds these images to the Spanish people. A popular reality television show lets the audience decide between life or death for suspected felons, and one of the opportunistic pan-handlers attempts to escape poverty through this raucous and sensational TV program.
IMDB Rating: 4.5
IMDB Votes: 220
Genere: Drama
Country: Spain
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: clever, cynical, suspense, offbeat, humorous, realistic, semi serious, biting
Similar in 78%
The Baroness and the Pig (2002)
Plot Summary:
A rich American woman and her French husband start a Parisian salon.
IMDB Rating: 5.5
IMDB Votes: 199
Genere: Drama
Country: Canada
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, sincere, touching, witty, contemplative, cynical, biting, suspense
Similar in 85%
After the Rain (1999)
Plot Summary:
A group of travelers is stranded in a small country inn when the river floods during heavy rains. As the bad weather continues, tensions rise amongst the travelers trapped at the inn. Ihei Misawa is a ronin, a samurai without a master, whose skills with a sword make him a valuable employee but whose brutal honesty and lack of social graces prevent him from staying with one master for too long. One night, Ihei impulsively offers to buy food and drink for the guests at a hotel; he doesn't have the money to pay, and to raise cash he concocts a scheme to take on anyone brave enough to fight him for a prize. Ihei's fighting skills impress Lord Shigeaki, who offers him a position as fencing master in his court. Ihei gratefully accepts, but when Shigeaki challenges him to a fight, Ihei beats the Lord decisively. Ihea is certain that he's managed to throw another opportunity away when a band of mercenaries attacks him, and his skills as a swordsman are put to the ultimate test.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan, France
Duration: 91 min
Plot tags: spiritual, jidai geki, atmospheric, serious, captivating, stylized
Similar in 88%
Samurai Rebellion (1967)
Plot Summary:
The mother of a feudal lord's only heir is kidnapped away from her husband by the lord. The husband and his samurai father must decide whether to accept the unjust decision, or risk death to get her back.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: tense, emotional, stylized, black and white, sincere, atmospheric, jidai geki, serious, captivating, suspenseful
Similar in 83%
Hanzo the Razor: The Snare (1973)
Plot Summary:
Against the backdrop of the Edo treasury devaluing currency and driving many into poverty, Hanzo Itami enforces the law without regard to status. He shows inadequate respect to the treasurer, who wants him dead.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Action, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: splatter, rough, offbeat, serious, captivating, realistic, stylized, sexual, jidai geki, grindhouse
Similar in 80%
The Bushido Blade (1981)
Plot Summary:
A steel samurai blade that was to be given to the American ambassador by the Emperor of Japan is stolen. American sailors and Japanese samurai are sent to find it.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 436
Genere: Action, Drama, History
Country: UK, USA, Japan
Duration: 104 min
Plot tags: action adventure, independent film, serious, realistic, suspenseful
Similar in 83%
The Light Shines Only There (2014)
Plot Summary:
A man has thrown away love and a woman has given up on love. The two souls meet in a brief summer in the northern city of Hakodate.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 663
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: rough, touching, serious, realistic, romantic, anthology, bleak
Similar in 83%
An Actor's Revenge (1963)
Plot Summary:
While performing in a touring kabuki troupe, leading female impersonator Yukinojo comes across the three men who drove his parents to suicide twenty years earlier, and plans his revenge, firstly by seducing the daughter of one of them, secondly by ruining them.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 115 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, stylized, psychological, offbeat, serious, realistic, suspenseful, jidai geki, light, noir
Similar in 77%
Incident at Blood Island (1970)
Plot Summary:
In the Edo period, a nameless ronin accepts an assignment to go to a mountain pass and wait. Near the pass he stops at an inn where a collection of characters gather, including a gang set on stealing shogunate gold that's soon to come over the pass. When the Ronin's assignment becomes clear, to help the gang, he's ordered to kill the inn's residents, including a woman he's rescued from an abusive husband. He's reluctant to murder innocent people; then he learns that the gold shipment is a trap and he's part of a double cross. How he sorts through these divided loyalties tests of his samurai honor, and perhaps of his love for a woman.
IMDB Rating: 7.1
IMDB Votes: 889
Genere: Action, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, jidai geki
Similar in 90%
Red Beard (1965)
Plot Summary:
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.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 21000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 185 min
Plot tags: black and white, cerebral, emotional, realistic, touching, existential, philosophical, psychedelic, spiritual, epic
Similar in 89%
Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai (2011)
Plot Summary:
An tale of revenge, honor and disgrace, centering on a poverty-stricken samurai who discovers the fate of his ronin son-in-law, setting in motion a tense showdown of vengeance against the house of a feudal lord.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan, UK
Duration: 128 min
Plot tags: tense, bleak, serious, emotional, realistic, erotic, intense, jidai geki, atmospheric, contemplative
Similar in 88%
The Ballad of Narayama (1983)
Plot Summary:
In a small village in a valley everyone who reaches the age of 70 must leave the village and go to a certain mountain top to die. If anyone should refuse he/she would disgrace their family. Old Orin is 69. This winter it is her turn to go to the mountain. But first she must make sure that her eldest son Tatsuhei finds a wife.
IMDB Rating: 7.8
IMDB Votes: 9000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: depressing, bleak, erotic, philosophical, neo noir, political, cerebral, serious, realistic, gloomy
Similar in 76%
Our Homeland (2012)
Plot Summary:
From the late 1950s through the '70s, more than 90,000 of the ethnic Koreans in Japan emigrated to North Korea, a country that promised them affluence, justice, and an end to discrimination. KAZOKU NO KUNI tells the story of one of their number, who returns for just a short period. For the first time in 25 years, Sonho is reunited with his family in Tokyo after being allowed to undergo an operation there. Sonho’s younger sister Rie is at the centre of the film, and is not hard to recognise as the director’s alter-ego. In her documentaries DEAR PYONGYANG and SONA, THE OTHER MYSELF, Yang Yonghi told the story of her own life, and how, at age six, she experienced the departure of her three older brothers, who left their family for Pyongyang.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 285
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic, contemplative, gloomy
Similar in 85%
Double Suicide (1969)
Plot Summary:
Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 142 min
Plot tags: surreal, romantic, mind bending, psychedelic, spiritual, serious, emotional, realistic, stylized, jidai geki
Similar in 77%
Tokyo Noir (2004)
Plot Summary:
In this excursion into Tokyo's dark side, a sexually repressed woman finds liberation by turning tricks at night a sex worker is taken by surprise when her ex drops by and a sex blogger finds strange kinship with a loner.
IMDB Rating: 6.5
IMDB Votes: 32
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 127 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, realistic
Similar in 86%
When the Last Sword is Drawn (2002)
Plot Summary:
Kanichiro Yoshimura is a Samurai and Family man who can no longer support his wife and children on the the low pay he receives from his small town clan, he is forced by the love for his family to leave for the city in search of higher pay to support them.
IMDB Rating: 7.4
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Japan
Duration: 143 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, bleak, captivating, realistic, serious, spiritual, jidai geki, stylized, gloomy
Similar in 82%
The Eel (1997)
Plot Summary:
White-collar worker Yamashita finds out that his wife has a lover visiting her when he's away, suddenly returns home and kills her. After eight years in prison, he returns to live in a small village, opens a barber shop (he was trained as a barber in prison) and talks almost to no-one except for the eel he "befriended" in prison. One day he finds the unconscious body of Keiko, who attempted suicide and reminds him of his wife. She starts to work at his shop, but he doesn't let her become close to him.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 117 min
Plot tags: enigmatic, captivating, psychological, touching, independent film, atmospheric, offbeat, serious, realistic, contemplative
Similar in 90%
The Hidden Blade (2004)
Plot Summary:
Set in 19th Century Japan a young samurai who finds himself in love with a farm girl leaves his home to begin a new life. He has to take stock of his new life when he is put to the test and ordered to kill a traitor who just happens to be his dearest friend.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: Japan
Duration: 132 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, stylized, romantic, epic, jidai geki, realistic, gloomy, period drama
Similar in 90%
The Twilight Samurai (2002)
Plot Summary:
Seibei Iguchi leads a difficult life as a low ranking samurai at the turn of the nineteenth century. A widower with a meager income, Seibei struggles to take care of his two daughters and senile mother. New prospects seem to open up when the beautiful Tomoe, a childhood friend, comes back into he and his daughters' life, but as the Japanese feudal system unravels, Seibei is still bound by the code of honor of the samurai and by his own sense of social precedence. How can he find a way to do what is best for those he loves?.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 25000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: Japan
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: tense, emotional, sincere, atmospheric, realistic, touching, talky, lyrical, sentimental, jidai geki
Similar in 77%
The Final Curtain (2002)
Plot Summary:
The Final Curtain is a British film from 2002 directed by Patrick Harkins and starring Peter O'Toole. It tells the story of J. J. Curtis, ageing gameshow host played by O'Toole, who hires novelist Jonathan Stitch (Adrian Lester) to pen his biography, in the hope of sealing his immortality in the hearts and minds of the British public. This is made more difficult by his rivalry with fellow gameshow host Dave Turner (Aidan Gillen), and events from his past.
IMDB Rating: 5.6
IMDB Votes: 577
Genere: Drama
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 85 min
Plot tags: serious, witty, clever, realistic, black comedy, cynical, biting, dark comedy, suspense
Similar in 82%
Silence (1971)
Plot Summary:
Two Jesuit priests encounter persecution when they travel to Japan in the 17th century to spread Christianity and search for their mentor.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, History
Country: Japan
Duration: 129 min
Plot tags: spiritual, existential, atmospheric, bleak, serious, captivating, realistic, contemplative, stylized
Similar in 88%
Kabei: Our Mother (2008)
Plot Summary:
Set in Tokyo in 1940, the peaceful life of the Nogami Family suddenly changes when the father, Shigeru, is arrested and accused of being a Communist. His wife Kayo works frantically from morning to night to maintain the household and bring up her two daughters with the support of Shigeru's sister Hisako and Shigeru's ex-student Yamazaki, but her husband does not return. WWII breaks out and casts dark shadows on the entire country, but Kayo still tries to keep her cheerful determination, and sustain the family with her love. This is an emotional drama of a mother and an eternal message for peace.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 133 min
Plot tags: sincere, touching, serious, emotional, realistic, captivating, disturbing
Similar in 87%
AFR (2007)
Plot Summary:
Danmarks statsminister Anders Fogh Rasmussen er blevet myrdet. Den hovedmistænkte er statsministerens homoseksuelle elsker Emil. I tiden efter mordet møder vi en lang række af verdens politikere og magtfulde mennesker, fra Kofi Annan til Pia Kjærsgaard. De forholder sig til mordet og ikke mindst til mennesket Anders Fogh Rasmussen.
IMDB Rating: 5.3
IMDB Votes: 473
Genere: Drama
Country: Denmark
Duration: 83 min
Plot tags: clever, serious, cynical, thought provoking, mockumentary, realistic, disturbing, contemplative, biting, suspense
Similar in 76%
The Sea Is Watching (2002)
Plot Summary:
Based on Akira Kurosawa's final unproduced script, this Edo-period drama takes place almost entirely inside an ocean-village brothel. O-Shin is a young brothel worker who one night helps a young samurai escape from his pursuers. Against the warnings of her fellow workers, particularly Kikuno and the brothel's owner, O-Shin falls in love with the samurai.
IMDB Rating: 7.0
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Romance, Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 119 min
Plot tags: sentimental, serious, realistic, touching, captivating, contemplative, gloomy, jidai geki
Similar in 79%
Kaiji: The Ultimate Gambler (2009)
Plot Summary:
Itou Kaiji is a bum who steals car emblems and slashes tires on what seems to be a regular basis. This routine changes one day when he is paid a visit by a man in a trench-coat. Once the two get talking, it seems that the visitor (Calling himself Endou) is a debt collector. The reason for his visit is an unpaid loan which kaiji had previously co-signed for a work-mate (Furuhata Takeshi). The original loan was 30000 yen and once Takeshi had disappeared, the loan then fell on Kaiji. Kaiji is then told of a way to clear the interest compounded debt (which stood at 3,850,000 yen), which involved getting on a boat with others in his position. Once on the boat the debtors would then have to gamble with loaned money, which would end with a few winning, and others getting into deeper debt and having to work to pay of their debts. After some coercing kaiji accepts a position on the boat, in order to clear himself and make a bit of money as well.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: Japan
Duration: 130 min
Plot tags: tense, psychological, captivating, anime, atmospheric, exciting, rough, serious, realistic, suspenseful