Screenwriter Yumiko Inoue and producer Hiroki Ueda join forces to spin a wholly new type of nurse story reminiscent of an ancient inner palace drama. Set in a top-class hospital where nurses cater to a very exclusive and well-heeled class of clientele, a once altruistic nurse, Akari Arimura, lands work in the hospital where the country’s most elite politicians, entertainers and intelligentsia spare no cost for pampered medical care.
Seeking a rich husband after enduring harsh treatment at her former place of employment, Arimura finds herself once again at the bottom of a rigid pecking order controlled by a domineering head nurse who makes life hell for Arimura and her fellow, low-ranking, “generic” nurses as they become embroiled in “palace” politics, infighting and romance. A moving and romantic tale of personal growth proving that nurses are human, too.

“Can bonds among strangers grow to be stronger than family?”
Inspiring human drama with a touch of comedy plays out among strangers working in a converted “home restaurant run by a retired husband and wife (Hiroshi Tachi and Atsuko Asano) in the second season of a popular television series about contemporary family life. In the first season, a homemaker (Asano) with 3 children all grown up, married and independent, convinces her husband Daigo (Tachi) to turn part of their home into a restaurant and dormitory for hired help, and the setting for sticky human relations.Yoko Uchida (Mirai Ishida), Noboru Otake (Shota Yasuda, Kanjani), Eri Chiba (Mahiru Konno) have all made fresh new starts to their lives, but now must face the arrival of new employees who all of troubled back stories of their own.

Company man, Daigo Nagashima, is facing retirement with great anticipation. His children have all grown up, gotten married or live independently. But when his wife, Aya, confesses that it's been her long-cherished dream to run a cafe restaurant out of her home, Daigo's vision of a post-career life of ease and relaxation vanishes. But after all of Aya's years as a devoted homemaker raising the family. Daigo decides to lend support his wife's fulfillment of her dream. The ensuing life is far from quiet and uneventful. When the restaurant finally opens, Daigo finds that the young workers hired as restaurant staff all come with issues and concerns of their own forcing Daigo, who had left all the childrearing and disciplining of his own children to his wife, having to provide counsel and mentoring. Here for the first time, he discovers where real strength of family lies, and in the process of helping conflicted youth resolve a series of problems, genuine family ties are born.

Do you have a teacher you will never forget?
An ordinary looking school and a typical classroom. So many students have passed through it over the years; as have many battle-scarred teachers. A message on the blackboard embodies three dramatic periods in Japan’s postmodern history. There was the time just after World War II, the economic miracle that followed, and the recent devastating earthquake and tsunami. Viewed from three fascinating and iconoclastic teachers living through these three revolutionary milestones moments, here is a story that drives at the heart of education. What did these children learn? What were the adults able to impart to them? What does it mean to be Japanese? And what are the hopes and dreams of people of all ages?

"Hammer Session": a Mexican slang term for beating rules and norms into a person's brain. A paddy wagon plummets into the sea allowing the escape of brilliant con artist, Otowa No.4. While on the run, he meets Goro Hachisuka, a rookie school teacher who had tried to burn down the elite prep school where he worked in an attempt to combat some evildoing students. "Human psychology is a surprisingly easy thing to understand," No 4 preaches before deciding to vicariously assume the identity of Goro Hachisuka, and take up the teacher's challenge for himself. No4 sets about putting the problem students straight by turning to his wide arsenal of Draconian con man techniques - "hammer sessions."

A modern retelling of the classic 1887 Francis Burnett story, The Little Princess, about a precocious young girl of wealthy upbringing who one day finds her life turned upside down and all her privileges taken away when the family goes bankrupt. Cast into the role of a penniless servant, Seira fights on, never losing her pride, cheer nor compassion come whatever adverse circumstances. An inspirational and timeless story sure to be the purest and most heroic told this year.