Born 1957 in Tokyo, Rino Katase (かたせ梨乃) is a Japanese actress.
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In this gripping period drama, Matsudaira Ukon, the younger brother of the 11th Tokugawa Shogun Ienari, lives in the city as Yabutaro, a doctor in the Ukiyo Koji district, while fighting the evil that has infested the city of Edo....
SMAP×SMAP was an ongoing weekly Japanese variety show on Kansai TV and Fuji TV starring the members of SMAP. The show began on April 15, 1996 and it aired from 22:00 to 22:54 every Monday. The show's usual ratings were higher than 20%, which is considered high since most variety shows range from 10-20%. Each episode begins a variety of skits, comedic performances, and/or games. These are followed by Bistro SMAP, in which the SMAP members compete against each other to impress celebrity judges w...
During turbulent economic times in Japan, Masahiko Washizu leads a foreign investment fund and is criticized for being a vulture. He tries to buy a bank and another company that are experiencing financial depression....
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Set in present day Tokyo, Shishio Homare (Dean Fujioka) works as a freelancer crime consultant. From an early age, Shishio Homare has been fascinated with how people become criminals and in original sin. He is a genius, but he also has an impulse to commit crimes. Shishio Homare works on cases which interests him among police or customer requests. Meanwhile, Junichi Wakamiya (Takanori Iwata) is a psychiatrist. He is smart and cool-headed. Due to a case, Junichi Wakamiya gets involved with Shish...
Dako is a con woman. She stays at a suite in a luxury hotel and schemes to take money from vicious wealthy people like yakuza bosses and evil businessmen. She works with Boku-chan and Richard. Boku-chan is a sincere and timid young con man. Richard is a veteran con man. Dako is able to master knowledge from various professions in a short period of time and disguises herself as someone working in that field. Along with Boku-chan and Richard, they carry their plans using fantastic teamwork....
Set in a sushi restaurant in Tokyo shortly after the end of the war, the story follows a stubborn, old-fashioned master and his hot-tempered, brash apprentice growing up among the warm-hearted people of downtown Tokyo....
Set against the backdrop of the reign of the 11th Tokugawa Shogun, Ienari Tokugawa, this drama is a masterpiece of action period drama that broke the mold of traditional detective stories and attracted a great deal of attention....
The time is the early 1800s. Keijiro Moriguchi loses his only daughter, Michiyo, in an unfortunate incident just before his wedding ceremony, and adopts Konosuke, who was supposed to be his son-in-law. Three years later, he hands over the family estate to Konosuke, welcomes his wife, Satsuki, and retires, becoming a dormitory (manager) of a merchant's villa in Negishi Village. Keijiro's second life begins in order to heal......
The 33rd NHK Asadora. Starring Eisaku Shindou as a man who loves manzai (a traditional style of stand-up comedy in Japanese culture). Average rating of 40.2% Based on the life of a famous two-man comedy act writer, Akita Minoru, who loved comedy more than anything. His life itself was full of wit and humor, love and friendship....
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Ueba Kamo is a career woman who works as a government official at the Ministry of Finance after graduating from Tokyo University. One day, her mother who is the landlady of an old Japanese-style hotel “Ueba-ya” in Kyoto, suddenly passes away, and she has to take over the hotel as a new landlady. It is hard enough for Kamo to take on this total new type of job, but she is also surrounded by tough and intensive employees. She then teams up with a calculating and clever financier named Kinugawa Shu...
After participating to a previous show where they have to bet or be challenged to any kind of competitions, the losing members of the Gaki no Tsukai are selected to spend 24 hours in a setting which they have no knowledge of the theme nor the course of the events. They are exposed to various absurd and crazy situations nonstop for 24 hours and must refrain from laughing. If they do so, hang-men appear and hit the rule breakers with a weapon (the weapon varies every year)....
Centered around typical Japanese food, a solitary salesman travelling through the country for business purposes, eats at its various establishments and experiences the various delicacies of Japanese cuisine....
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Fumi becomes Genzui Kusaka’s wife. During the turbulent times of the closing days for the Tokugawa shogunate, she lives positively and tries to keep up Shoin Yoshida's will. Shoin Yoshida is her older brother and intellectual....
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A striking drama of the amazingly gifted surgeon Zaizen Goro, caught up by his desire for power and fame, and his contemporary physician Satomi Shuji, who selflessly continues a quest to save human lives. The Great White Tower is the title of a representative novel by Toyoko Yamazaki that depicts the hidden side of the medical world and the dignity of human life, thus shocking and moving many readers, marking a milestone in medical dramas. A dense human drama develops starting with the first hal...
“Please find my dead body.” Bestselling author Moribayashi Asami posts a message hinting at suicide on her blog and then disappears without a trace. Despite her absence, her blog continues to update, revealing one by one the secrets of the people connected to her… The shocking blog posts throw her husband Mishima Masataka into turmoil. Meanwhile, her editor, Ikegami Saori searches for the promised new manuscript, terrified that her affair with Masataka will be exposed. As time passes with no lea...
A program that uses a script written by Koki Mitani and is produced by a different cast and crew each time. As the narration at the beginning of the show says: "If you think you can create the same work with the same script, you don't know drama". This is a drama that clearly shows how the atmosphere of a work changes depending on the direction, making it ideal for those who aspire to become directors....
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The Oedo Investigative Network investigates a mysterious fire one evening. Could it be connected to a mysterious man in an eyepatch who just came into town?...
After robbing a Moscow casino right under Zenigata's nose, Lupin is given a job to return 6 treasures to their original areas for an old friend of his, so Lupin can receive an even better treasure to gain....
Kensuke Sonomura directs the legendary Hitoshi Ozawa in this ultimate V-Cinema actioner. Kaiko City is plagued with poverty and crime. When a corrupt businessman decides to run for mayor and starts eliminating opponents from the rival mafia, a former police captain serving time for murder is secretly released and put in charge of a special task force to arrest him....
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A biographical story of Tomoatsu Godai, the influential entrepreneur of the Meiji era who laid the foundation of the modern Japanese economy....
Rin Jyoshima lost her father to death-by-gambling; years later, she's grown up in the Kosugi household and has fallen victim to gambling herself....
A ruined businessman was forced to sell his daughter, Hisano, to a brothel in Yoshiwara, the largest red-light district in Tokyo. The owner of the brothel has hopes to make her a great new addition which will attract the richest of customers. But after several months of training, she tries to flee Yoshiwara when the time has come for her to take her first customer......
Pocky, an upbeat high-schooler, is told she will die in three days by a psychic whose predictions always come true. Along the way, she talks about boyfriends with her two friends, meets a strange boy with heart disease, and regularly bumps into a serial bomber....
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This feature drama, produced to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Fuji TV, is an adaptation of Victor Hugo's classic masterpiece Les Miserables set in the 1990s in Japan. In Kobe in 1993, Jun Baba gets taken to a juvenile prison due to a killing of a man who cheated his mother out of all her money in self-defense. One day, he hears that his younger brother, who has been desperately ill, is in a critical condition and breaks out. However, he finds out his brother is already dead. In the depth of...
Katagiri, a highly ambitious young detective, teams up with older detective Takiguchi, who is about to retire, to investigate a murder that took place by Sumida River. Katagiri is annoyed by Takiguchi's pushiness, but is surprised to hear that the victim was a suspect in the 300 million yen robbery....
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Yasuo Furuhata directs this romantic yakuza flick based on a book by popular romance novelist Tomiko Miyao. Set in 1932, the film centers on Peony (Yoko Minamino), a geisha who was forced into the business at a young age by her dissipated father....
While her husband is in prison doing time, Tamaki, the wife of a yakuza capo, runs her spouse’s gang with an iron hand. Meanwhile, Makoto, her younger sister, marries a member of a rival band after being raped by him. The two sisters, united by blood ties but married to enemy yakuzas, will ultimately have to decide whose side they’re on....
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Shiro Akitsu goes on a relentless search for his abducted 7-year-old daughter, with the aid of an Ainu dog summoned by a whistle she gave him....
An illustration of the tragic lives of geishas at a popular geisha house, Shinonomero. Shortly after being sold to a geisha house at age 5, Shizu is befriended by a fellow older geisha, Tsuru. After years of living and working together, Tsuru and Shizu manage to run the operations of Shinonomero as the proprietress and assistant. Despite vows to never to let their lovers come between them or Shinonomero, moments of weakness leave Tsuru and Shizu caught up in a web of betrayal and plunged into de...
Prostitutes in burnt out Tokyo ghetto of post-WWII Japan peddle their flesh and save one-third of their money for a proposed dancehall to be named Paradise. The hookers live in a bombed-out building, but they accept the precarious situation with typical resolve....
The story of beautiful Christian nun, Kyoko who is the object of affection for two very different men - one the happy-go-lucky yakuza gangster, Haruhiko who is the next-in-line to takeover the ragtag "Tenryu Gumi" gang and the other bumbling police detective Kumashiro. The Tenryu Gumi is a collection of misfits and other troublemakers but are relatively peaceful due to their Christian beliefs. Their bitter rivals are the more traditional "Kuroiwa Gumi", a much more sadistic and violent group led...
Two historical incidents that deepened the friendship between Japan and Turkey are connected in this story of friendship and compassion: In the night of 16 September 1890 the Turkish frigate Ertuğrul is caught up in a typhoon and sinks off the Japanese coast. Risking their own lives, local villagers are able to rescue 69 Turkish sailors. Although being very poor and having hardly to eat, the villagers share what little they have with strangers from a country 9,000 kilometers away. 95 years later...
Mitsuo, unhappy in his new job as a shoe salesman, is invited to a festival and is introduced to a friend’s sister. Tora-san meanwhile helps an injured housewife on her yearly vacation....
Kazuya Takajo was a promising soccer player. At the age of 23, he was selected for the national A football team and he bought a house to live with his fiancé Miki Nakagawa. One day, Kazuya Takajo gets into a car accident and becomes paralyzed and falls into deep despair. Kazuya goes through rehab on the strength of his wife's love. Yet, he becomes frustrated by those opposed to his marriage with Miki and others who give him pity looks. He also can't find anything to replace soccer in his life. K...
Three high school boys leave their dormitory and go to a resort and fall in love....
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Kasuga’s husband gets arrested for a murder of his beloved protégé. She and her family investigate and find out he was trapped by greedy Nagoshi, the boss of their rival yakuza family. She has to make a decision to revenge Nagoshi....
The wife of a recently deceased yakuza boss is caught in a conflict between the candidates for his succession and must protect her beloved daughter....
A Yakuza boss's wife and the widow of a rival crime syndicate's murdered leader bond over a common purpose: to seek vengeance....
The wife of a yakuza lieutenant tries to keep the peace when the clan's heir suddenly dies and a succession conflict threatens to break out....
Recently released from prison for a murder sentence, a yakuza boss's wife leaves Hong Kong for a fresh start, but a betrayal leads to her return....
Yuki, the wife of a leading member of the Domoto family, must assume her husband’s role as a yakuza boss while he serves out a prison sentence. As she grows into her new role, she manages to assert control and increase the influence of her organization. But when her husband is released from prison, she finds him a changed man, lacking the character necessary to be a powerful yakuza leader. Conflict ensues and their marriage is challenged by a desire for power....
Upon the passing of the Sakanishi Clan’s boss, a fierce battle between his wife Hazuki and his disciple Terada breaks out. Will Hazuki be able to assume her husband’s position as the head of the established yakuza clan?...
On the last leg of of a train ride from Moscow to Manchuria during the early years of World War Two, one of the passengers suddenly disappears. All of the other passengers, including military personnel and civilians from both the Axis powers and Allied nations, have reasons to be suspected. As the remaining passengers investigate, more murders are committed, until at last the political and personal motives of the killer (killers?) are unravelled....
A medical team is dispatched to the patients on a helicopter to provide medical care in the field as soon as possible. One day, four young physicians are assigned to this latest medical system. The doctors experience traumatic medical situations, deal with personal ambitions, witness the fragility of life, and they grow personally and professionally....
Based on the novel "Tsuyoki Ari" by Seicho Matsumoto In her past, Isako Sawada ran a restaurant. She then met Nobuhiro who is 31 years older than her and an executive of a corporation. They eventually married. Nobuhiro owns a large mansion and his money is managed by housekeeper Saki Tsubaki. Isako Sawada doesn't like that arrangement, but she hides her contempt because she has a plan. Her plan is to become a widow in 3 years and inherit one billion yen from her husband. Isako Sawada schemes to ...
A hard working salaryman takes off five days from his busy job and sets off with his wife and two children to visit his parents in his hometown for the 1991 new year holidays. He decides that they will go by car to save on expenses. Unfortunately, the long drive from Tokyo to his hometown becomes a much longer journey than expected due to traffic, sickness and other misfortunes and by the time they arrive three days later, they only have time for a short but happy visit....
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One evening, when the monk Saito Musashibo Benkei was luring for his sword number 1000 at Gojo bridge, Shanao (later Yoshitsune), a young man of small and fragile stature passed by. He wore a nice sword and played the flute....
Yoshihiko now lives with a couple of old friends, a married couple, Ryosuke and Aya. They share a past in several senses. It was Ryosuke who walked off with Yoshihiko’s girlfriend Aya. In doing so, he broke up with his own girlfriend, Reiko. Now they are all back together again and old feelings begin to surface....
Ichiro Numata (Hiroaki Murakami) is the chief editor of a publishing company. He suddenly falls unconscious and is hospitalized, but various cases takes place at the hospital. Hospital Director Kenichiro Asashima and Chief Nurse Junko Amemiya goes missing. There are rumors that they were in a close relationship. Head of Drug Management, Yasuharu Horimura is found dead. Rumors were that he stalked Junko Amemiya. The investigation into his dead is carried out as a suicide case, but Detective Eij...
The story of the relationship between a college student whose relationship with her boyfriend is going nowhere and a bisexual medical artist who makes prosthetic body parts. Haru is a college student ignored by her boyfriend yet believes she is still in love with him. One day at a café, Haru meets Riko, a medical artist (prosthetist) who creates body parts in order to disguise clients’ missing pieces, lost due to accident or disease. Both were alone, but struck up an immediate friendship and clo...
A woman works as a prostitute and attendant to make a living at a bathhouse. She is athletic and is an avid runner. She has met and adopted a white dog and the two have become inseparable. It is the biggest tragedy and calamity when the dog is found dead, killed, murdered. The woman swears to find justice by finding the murderer and making things right....
A Japanese Yakuza gangster's deadly existence in his homeland gets him exiled to Los Angeles, where he is taken in by his little brother and his brother's gang....
The tale of Taira Kiyomori who started as a young inexperienced warrior who led the Heike into the battle against the brutal pirates on Setouchi....
High school student Mariko sings in the choir at the all-girls school she attends, and her biggest dream right now is to go to a music college. One day on her way home from school, she accidentally drops her bookbag into the sea. A man jumps into the water and recovers the bag for her, but all of her score sheets have been ruined. From that day on, Mariko’s new acquaintance becomes her bodyguard, walking her home everyday. But for some reason, he refuses to tell her his name....
The classic tale retold. This is one of Japan’s most popular stories in a brand new version starring the great Matsukata Hiroki following in the footsteps of Yorozuya Kinnosuke as Yagyu Tajima, the grandmaster swordsman whose plot to maintain the succession of Iemitsu as shogun encounters obstacles on all sides. Loaded with action and featuring many of Japan’s new up and coming sword stars this exciting movie brings back the feelings of the golden age of motion pictures. Stunning cinematograp...
Brings Shingo face to face against Yagyu Tajima, the Shogun’s fencing instructor in a match that could save a domain near Osaka. Meanwhile Shogun Yoshimune must face a painful decision whether or not he can finally see his son for the first time....
The classic tale of the shogun's illegitimate son Aoi Shingo is told in three parts as he strives to become the greatest fencer in Japan, while his father Shogun Tokugawa Yoshimune seeks to reunite with his lost son. Part 1 sets up the story and introduces the characters. When the secrets of Shingo's birth are revealed to him, it sets off a series of events that bring him to cross swords with members of the shogun's inner circle. ...
The final part takes Shingo into a confrontation with his friend Yagyu Katsunoshin’s uncle in a duel that could change the destiny of Japan....
After Shogo Ogami’s death in Hiroshima, Detective Shuichi Hioka successfully implemented Shogo Ogami’s plan, which was to control the yakuza to prevent further gang wars and save innocent people from getting harmed. Shuichi Hioka manages the criminal organizations, but, due to one evil person who gets released from prison, the situation drastically changes....
Jutaro Torikai is a senior detective set to uncover the truth behind an apparent double suicide....
This TV dramatization of Kitakata Kenzo's hard-boiled novel depicts a man who fights a deadly battle with a group of corrupt bosses who control the hot spring town. Sakaguchi, the owner of a long-established inn in a seaside hot spring town, rebels against the Shimoyama Tourism company that dominates the town, and is arrested by the police for a minor assault. One day, Sakaguchi's old best friend Shindo shows up and tells Sakaguchi's son that he will definitely get his father out of the police. ...
The Sagami family has been running an Edo-style woodworking shop in downtown Tokyo for generations. The head of the family, Bunzo (Kunie Tanaka), has received official recognition for his craftsmanship, but business remains modest. He lives with his wife, Sumiko (Masumi Harukawa), their divorced eldest daughter, Naomi (Rino Katase), and their heir, Seiichi (Hiroyuki Sanada). One day, Seiichi tells his parents that he has someone he wants them to meet—his former junior in school, Yuko Ogata (Ann...
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