A woman’s teens, 20s and 30s - each decade brings its own level of expectations and anxieties. These watershed life moments tend to highlight issues of employment, love, marriage, childbirth, and parenting, with the added pressure of perceived time limits. Three so-called “9-border” sisters - aged 19, 29, and 39 - gather under one roof after their father's sudden disappearance struggle with love, life, and time issues in this melodrama about finding happiness and moving forward in life.

Ever since gifted conductor Natsume’s wife and daughter left him five years ago, he has isolated himself from the music scene. Then one day, he decides to return to Japan for the first time in decades to conduct a small town orchestra and return to his estranged daughter, Hibiki, who loathes him and his music. Now he must try to thaw a relationship with his daughter frozen in time for five years, and learn to be a father.

Stepmom Akiko grows concerned when daughter Miyuki, who is about to graduate from college, seems content to work part-time at Bakery Mugita without looking for a “real” job. After Akiko lectures Miyuki about her tardiness to job-hunting, they begin researching companies together. But no sooner do they start when Miyuki drops a bombshell. “I want to get married!” sending Akiko and everyone including bakery owner Mugita into a frenzy.

Nagumo is a social studies teacher at Mie Prefectural Etsuzan High School. A former baseball player in college who had to retire due to injury, he worked as a sports trainer before turning to his “other dream” of becoming a teacher at 32. When he is made advisor for the high school’s weak and disbanding baseball team, his life begins to come full circle, and strives to produce a miraculous turnaround for the team in this uplifting tale of love and baseball.

It begins as any other day with commuters and passengers catching the 8:23 train. That is, until one train car suddenly warps into a wormhole and lands in a devastated future world. Without smartphones or social media, the passengers must confront extraordinary and extreme conditions. Mere strangers yesterday, they must face their worst fears and instincts for survival, deception, and love as they fight to get back home in this exploration of how people deal with unprecedented events.

Shinya Sugi is an architect who lost his parents at 15, and then his sister to illness. Now, he sleepwalks through life as a water meter reader until a friend takes him to a rice ball shop called Tachibana. There he is dumbfounded to meet the owner, Kaoru, who looks identical to his late sister. Kaoru has a knack for helping customers untangle their life problems and bring a smiles to their faces. Shinya, however, poses his biggest challenge in this miraculously heart-wrenching drama.

Hazama is a brilliant surgeon who runs a patisserie by day, creating cakes with the same ingenuity and dexterity he applies to surgery. But in his other life, he leads a secretive and powerful medical team willing to apply daring and unrivaled skills to any surgical challenge for an exorbitant fee. With his international legal partner Shimoyamada handling the client negotiations, Hazama takes scalpel into his own genius hands in this unprecedented type of medical human drama.

When childhood friends Yui and Naoki are by chance reunited as adults, they begin to feel they were destined for each other. However, just as Naoki prepares to propose to Yui, he becomes embroiled in a mysterious incident and dies.
Now Naoki's soul wanders the world unable to express his true feelings for Yui. Yuzuru, a detective and the only person who can see Naoki, goes in pursuit of the truth behind Naoki’s death. At Naoki tries to use Yuzuru to talk to Yui, but will he be able to convey his message of love?

It’s 1945, and World War II has just ended. A glacial winter, reaching 40 degrees Celsius below zero... Day after endless day of merciless labor, fueled only by scarce rations. Amidst the men dying off one by one in the hellish Soviet concentration camp is Hatao Yamamoto. “You must not give up hope. The day of domoy (going home) will come,” Yamamoto implores consistently to the despairing captives.
Under the dire conditions of the camp, there are ceaseless fights among the Japanese captives. Yet come what may, Yamamoto continues to cheer the men up regardless of rank and character. His heartfelt actions and beliefs gradually warm the frozen hearts of his fellow captives. Yamamoto believes through everything that he will someday go home to be with his wife and four children.
Eight years after the war, a postcard arrives from Yamamoto’s beloved wife. In the letter, passed through rigorous censorship, is written, “I am waiting for your return.” Tears stream down Yamamoto’s face as he thinks of his wife, raising their four children on her own. Everyone felt the day of domoy was near, but meanwhile, Yamamoto is subjected to illness. His health deteriorates rapidly, but Yamamoto never gives up hope that he will one day be reunited with his family. Aching to do something for their dear friend, his comrades set out to accomplish an extraordinary feat under the scrutiny of the guards.

Copyright:
”Fragments of The Last Will”based on ”RAGERI KARA KITA ISHO” by Jun HENMI (BUNGEISHUNJU LTD.)
©2022“Fragments of Last Will”Film Partners
©1989 SHIMIZU Kyoko

Miyako is a beautiful salesperson on the fast track at a major cosmetics company earning more than 100 grand a year. But when she begins to question her life, she drops everything to pursue a past dream to become a painter. At a cram school for getting into an art institute, she meets a cute yet younger painter with prodigious artistic talent, but he’s also a penniless jerk. Can Miyako capture both her dream and romance in this newfangled rich-woman-poor-man love story?

Haruto is a young businessman whose game company struck it rich, giving him a fancy suburban home, a beautiful wife, Michiru, and a grade school daughter. But when the daughter is taken in a serial kidnapping, Haruto reassesses his priorities. Confronted with a series of challenges and revelations about people, he and Michiru fight to get their daughter back the only way they can: by themselves, in this non-stop thriller about family bonds under the most trying of circumstances.

Since losing his beloved wife 10 years ago, Keisuke vows to never remarry. He wants happiness for his only daughter, Mai, but struggles to make a good living and their communication suffers. That is until the appearance before them of a mysterious young girl carrying a schoolbag who claims to be Keisuke’s wife. Reincarnation? An offbeat family life ensues comprised of devoted husband Keisuke, his former wife (now a grade schooler) and a daughter who won’t grow up.

Company worker Akiko finds that a business she helped to revive has been taken over by a vulture capitalist, Ryoji, who looks identical to her deceased husband. When Ryoji’s next acquisition turns out to be a beloved bakery, Akiko suspects an ulterior motive and vows to resist. Caught between hatred of vulture capitalists and budding feelings toward her new boss, Akiko finds support from her stepdaughter, Miyuki, who is dedicated to looking out for her stepmom in this heartwarming drama.

Tokyo 2023. Japan’s prime minister announces a plan to store contaminated material in deep-sea strata while entrusting a team of young technocrats to protect Japan’s future. Meanwhile, the public is alarmed by sensational magazine articles predicting the sinking of the Kanto plain owing to the disappearance of an island off the Izu coast. With demonstrators in the streets, a young government official Amami tries to restore order just as a corruption scandal linking the government to a profitable eco-business firm erupts. When Amami and a government colleague escape for a scuba diving trip, they encounter an earth-shattering event.

Akiko's back! This special picks up a year after the series ended . When we l as t saw Akiko, an ambitious career woman, she 'd just started work ing again after a long hiatus , but out of the blue she’s been fired f rom her high-powered job. Her stepdaughter Miyuki is now a university student living in Tokyo. Akiko hasn't seen Miyuki for a while, and she's in for a big surprise! When Akiko arrives, Miyuki’s boss is there wearing only a towel, holding a baby! Have these two had a baby together?! It wasn't easy for Akiko as a working person to be a stepmom, but she gave it her all, and Miyuki loved her back.
Don’t miss the new adventures of this loveable family.

Natsuki Obana is a charismatic Japanese chef running a 2-star restaurant in Paris. Despite an extreme pride and confidence, he can’t seem to earn the 3 stars he covets. Feeling the pressure of a career slipping away, Obana’s troubles are compounded when his restaurant is caught in a scandal that forces its closure and the departure of his staff. Amid his despair, a glimmer of hope arrives when he encounters a female chef with whom he is encouraged to start anew. Assembling a staff of talented chefs, he launches his restaurant but is constantly clashing with personnel. Can a middle-aged man once knocked down recover the verve of youth necessary to achieve a lifelong dream?

“If you don’t make your quotas, you’re all fired!”
Desperate bankers battle a colossal organization In a fight song for the masses.
Hiroshi Kataoka is a banker who knows things aren’t right, but endures it anyway. “It’s for the good of the company,” he tells himself. And Hiroshi is true and proper Japanese “salaried man.” But he’s also a man of passion who can’t help but be moved by the hard work of his subordinates and colleagues. So right before his 50th birthday, when he gets news that he will be promoted to manager of the Kamata branch that has been earmarked for eventual closure, he is conflicted. “Don’t kill yourself working for a branch that’s closing,” his bosses advise him. “You’ll get good treatment when you return to headquarters afterwards.” But no one under Hiroshi has any knowledge that their jobs are doomed.

A satisfyingly heart-warming comedy in support of all people struggling to make their way in an age of revolutionary changes to the workplace. First tackling the issue of overtime work, the drama spotlights not only systemic reforms taking place, but the change in mindset occurring among working people as they re-envision the shape of future society and the balance between life and work. Currently, Japanese society encompasses widening views on overtime including those who regard it as a necessary evil and others who still see it as a virtue. The protagonist in this story, however, does not. As is a new-age working girl with the personal motto: “Go home at the appointed time,” her working life is a constant battle with High-maintenance r colleagues and ethically-questionable superiors. And yet she still manages to discover small miracles every day, imparting pithy yet inspirational messages about Why we work, the importance of self-love and the value of friendship.

Nao Kitazawa, 34, leads a busy but fulfilling life as a doctor at a women’s clinic and as fiancee to an elite psychiatric physician, Yuchi Ihara. With their wedding day a month off, Nao is preparing to move into a new home when she meets Shinji Mamiya, a struggling writer who works part-time as a mover and falls inexorably in love with him. The fateful encounter compels Nao to follow her heart and experience true love. Overwhelmed by Nao’s passion, Shinji soon falls for her as well, but their budding romance is threatened by the tragic discovery that Nao has early onset Alzheimer’s. What unfolds is a story of pure love. As Nao’s symptoms worsen, Shinji spends the next ten years giving Nao mental and health support even as she begins to lose the precious memories they both shared.

Fulfilling a long-cherished dream, school teacher Hijiri Matsunaga is hired at a far-flung countryside middle school where she encounters, Akira Kuroiwa, a 9th grader with mysterious powers. Though 10 years younger than his teacher, Akira falls instantly in love with her and single-mindedly pursues her affections. But Hijiri has a devoted finance, Shotaro, with whom she keeps up a long-distance relationship. Aware that she should not reciprocate her student’s feelings for her, Hijiri eventually finds her heart swayed by Akira’s unremitting love and becomes attracted to him. Deeply conflicted between the affections of a pubescent youth and an elite company man, Hijiri’s “forbidden” love triangle engulfs those around her in this “forbidden yet pure” love story between student and pupil.

Suzu Urano is an innocent young woman who loves to draw pictures and lives in the seaside town called Eba district of Hiroshima. At the height of World War II in the Pacific with all the men off at the front, she finds herself as eldest daughter assisting with the family business of seaweed to make ends meet when an offer of marriage arises. The suitor is Shusaku Hojo, a young stenographer at the military court-martial who had fallen in love with her at first sight, but Suzu doesn’t remember ever having met him. Though uncomfortable with the idea of betrothing a man she doesn’t know, she gets swept along by the people and circumstances around her until marriage becomes a foregone conclusion. She finds the task of winning acceptance by Shusaku’s family hard going despite all of her pure and earnest efforts in this touching story of family love and survival amid the crucible of war.