Chōko Iida
Chôko Iida (飯田 蝶子, 15 April 1897 - 26 December 1972) was a Japanese actress. Her real name was Shigehara Tefu. She played working class women and grandmothers, and appeared in more than 300 films. Her husband was cameraman Shigehara Hideo. Description above from the... Read full bio →
Featured Characters
Roles you can spot in Whatthemovie snapshots
Sugata Sanshiro
The story of Sanshiro Sugata, a young man who wants to learn the new art of judo. A wise teacher reveals to Sanshiro that judo is not merely a means of combat nor a demonstration of physical skill, but an art which reveals the artist to himself.
Tsuma to shite onna to shite
The real mother of the two children of a respectable university professor is not his wife, but his mistress, the hostess of a Ginza bar the family frequents.
Muhomatsu no issho
The story of Muhōmatsu, a rickshaw man who becomes a surrogate father to the child of a recently widowed woman.
Iwashigumo
A war widow with a young boy manages a farm with her bossy mother-in-law. When a reporter comes to interview her, the two begin an affair. He turns out to be married and won't leave his wife.
Chibusa yo eien nare
Fumiko, mother of two and wife to an unfaithful man, shares her family life with her budding vocation as a poet. The beginning of her successful literary career coincides with her divorce and her breast cancer diagnosis. In her final stages, Fumiko meets a young journalist from Tokyo who wants to write a story on her experiences.
Gan
A young woman, who must support her father as a middle-aged man's mistress, finds herself falling in love with a student closer to her age.
Nora inu
In Akira Kurosawa's gritty Stray Dog, a young police detective gets his pistol stolen on a crowded bus during the oppressive heat of a late 1940s Tokyo summer. The gun is later used in a robbery and murder making finding it even more important.
Yoidore Tenshi
An alcoholic doctor builds a shaky friendship with a dying gangster
Nagaya shinshiroku
An errant salaryman's son gets lost until a man from the Tokyo tenements brings him to vendor Tane, who's reluctant to let the kid board.
Haru no mezame
Slice of life film centered on a couple of years in the life of a rural high school girl.
Kanko no machi
The few residents left on the streets in Tokyo share their individual stories and come to understand the melancholy of saying goodbye.
Utajo oboegaki
Uta’s mother died when she was six years old; her father she never met. She was forced to adopt a traveller’s life when her grandmother died, and now she is a dancer and part of a family of actors who travel from town to town, setting up street performances.
Todake no kyodai
After the death of her husband, Mrs Toda and her youngest daughter receive a frosty welcome from the extended family.
Shukujo wa nani o wasureta ka
A professor, Komiya, and his bossy wife, Tokiko, are to look after Setsuko, their high-spirited niece from Osaka. Despite being a minor, Setsuko is a liberated woman who does whatever she wants, including smoking. She even convinces Koyima to take her to a geisha house.
Hitori musuko
A poor factory worker, visiting the Tokyo son she has skimped to educate, finds even a college degree doesn't make a difference in Depression era Japan.
Tôkyô no yado
An unemployed Japanese man and his two sons wander the industrial flatlands of Depression-era Tokyo, until he chances upon an old friend and befriends a woman and her daughter, who are in a similar predicament.
Ukikusa monogatari
An aging actor returns to a small town with his troupe and reunites with his former lover and illegitimate son, a scenario that enrages his current mistress and results in heartbreak for all.
Tonari no Yae-chan
Keitaro is a law student and Yaeko is a high school girl. They are neighbors, and their friendship is starting to develop into something more romantic. Then, Yaeko's sister Kyouko has a breakup with her husband and returns home. Kyouko is clearly interested in Keitaro and Yae becomes anxious.
Yogoto no yume
In the formally ravishing Every-Night Dreams, set in the dockside neighborhoods of Tokyo, a single mother works tirelessly as a Ginza bar hostess to ensure a better life for her young son—until her long-lost husband returns.
Dekigokoro
In Depression-era Tokyo, a struggling middle-aged single father with a young son comes across a homeless young lady and convinces a bar owner to take her in.
Seishun no yume ima izuko
Ozu’s long-term collaborator Kogo Noda scripts a subtle shift from light to dark as Hirano’s carefree college life is marred by tragedy.
Tôkyô no kôrasu
During the Depression, a young man struggles to provide for his family after he is sacked for defending an older colleague.