Actor Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (1950)

Kubo and the Two Strings (2016) is an American stop-motion animated action fantasy film produced by Laika. The story takes place in feudal Japan, where a 12-year-old boy named Kubo lives with his ill mother in a mountain cave near a village. Despite having lost an eye, Kubo uses his magical abilities and plays the shamisen to make origami for the villagers. Through his performances, he shares the tale of his missing father Hanzo, a samurai warrior. However, Kubo is never able to complete the story as he doesn’t know what happened to his father and his mother’s deteriorating mental state prevents her from remembering the ending. She also warns him not to be ...

47 Ronin (2013) is an American film set in feudal Japan. It tells the story of the forty-seven rōnin, a group of masterless samurai who sought revenge for their daimyō Asano Naganori’s death at the hands of his rival Kira Yoshinaka. The film, based on the Japanese legend of Chūshingura, was directed by Carl Rinsch and written by Chris Morgan and Hossein Amini from an idea by Morgan and Walter Hamada. In this ...

The superhero film, Elektra (2005), is based on the character from Marvel Comics and directed by Rob Bowman. It serves as a spin-off of Daredevil (2003), with Jennifer Garner reprising her role as the titular character. After being killed, Elektra Natchios is revived by blind martial arts master Stick and trained in the ancient art of Kimagure. This allows her to have precognition and resurrect the dead. However, due to her inability to let go of her rage and fear towards her mother’s killer, she is expelled from the training compound. She then uses her skills to become a contract killer. Many years ...

Planet of the Apes (2001) is an American science fiction adventure film directed by Tim Burton and written by William Broyles Jr., Lawrence Konner, and Mark Rosenthal. Serving as the sixth installment in the Planet of the Apes film series, it is loosely based on Pierre Boulle’s 1963 novel and also acts as a remake of the 1968 movie adaptation. In 2029, Leo Davidson works closely with trained apes on the United ...

The film Pearl Harbor (2001) was directed by Michael Bay and produced by both Bay and Jerry Bruckheimer. Written by Randall Wallace, the story takes place in Tennessee in 1923 where two close friends, Rafe McCawley and Danny Walker, often play together in Danny’s father’s old biplane, pretending to be heroic pilots. Danny’s father is a World War One Veteran struggling with PTSD. Fast forward to January 1941 during the height of World War II, both Rafe and ...

Filmmaker Allan Eastman released the American action thriller adventure film, Danger Zone (1996). The story follows Rick Morgan, an American mining engineer who finds himself involved in a dangerous scheme involving toxic waste in the fictional African nation of Zambeze. His old friend Jim Scott tricks him into participating, but things quickly take a turn for the worst. A group of mercenaries led by Chang attack the mine and supposedly kill Scott. As the army arrives to investigate, the mercenaries flee and Morgan is left to take the blame for the deaths of innocent villagers due to the toxic waste. Thanks to ...

Rising Sun (1993), an American buddy cop crime thriller directed by Philip Kaufman, takes place at the newly opened Los Angeles headquarters of Nakamoto, a Japanese keiretsu. At a commencement gala, call girl Cheryl Lynn Austin is discovered dead after an apparent violent sexual encounter. LAPD Lieutenant Webster ‘Web’ Smith and John Connor, a former police captain with expertise in Japanese affairs, are tasked with acting as liaisons between the Japanese executives and the investigating officer – Smith’s former partner Tom Graham. As they begin their investigation, Connor and Smith review ...