Media🍿

Here you could find a collection of Japanese films and media to get you in the mood before your trip :)

Source: Unsplash List of recommendations:

🏯 Japanese Culture – Understand Before You Land

For those who want to explore Japan’s history, values, and mindset:

• 📘 Wabi-Sabi – on the aesthetics of imperfection

• 🎞️ Tokyo Story / Rashomon / Seven Samurai – classic films with deep cultural insight

• 📺 Shōgun (2024) – a modern series set in the samurai era

🌸 Human Japan – Emotions, Relationships & Everyday Life

For those who want to understand Japan through its small, human stories:

• 🎞️ Nobody Knows / Her Love Boils Bathwater / Perfect Days

• 📘 Before the Coffee Gets Cold / Convenience Store Woman / Kitchen

• 📺 Midnight Diner / Old Enough! – simple, touching slices of life

• 📘 Yakuza My Brother – personal perspectives from foreigners living in Japan

🍜 Food, Streets & City Life - Because your stomach deserves inspiration too

• 🎞️ Tanpopo – a comedy about Japanese food and the culture around it

• 📺 Paolo fromTOKYO – everyday life guides on YouTube

• 📲 Megan and Ben / Mr Yabatan – humor and daily life on TikTok & YouTube

🎨 Japanese Imagination – Magic, Nature & Emotion

For lovers of aesthetics, animation, and larger-than-life storytelling:

• 🎞️ Studio Ghibli films – Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, Ponyo, The Boy and the Heron, and more

• 📘 Haruki Murakami – Kafka on the Shore, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Norwegian Wood, and more

• 📘 I Am a Cat – classic Japanese humor through the eyes of a cat

🕊️ Hiroshima - Memory, History & Reflection

Works that help you understand, feel, and remember

For those interested in history, human memory - or preparing for a visit to the city.

📘 Books

Stories of testimony, pain, and hope:

• Hiroshima – John Hersey

• Barefoot Gen – Keiji Nakazawa

• Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes – Eleanor Coerr

• Summer Flowers – Tamiki Hara

🎥 Films

Cinema that brings emotion and faces to history:

• Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)

• Black Rain (1989)

• Barefoot Gen (1983)

• Children of Hiroshima (1952)

• White Light / Black Rain (2007)

• The Mushroom Club (2005)

📺 TV & Series

• Hiroshima (BBC, 2005) – docu-drama recreating the day of the bombing

• Japan’s Longest Day (1967) – about Japan’s moment of decision