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Based on three short stories by writer Fumiko Hayashi, “Late Chrysanthemums” traces the lives of four former geishas and the people around them in post-war Japan, a time when the local economy was still struggling but gradually beginning to recover. The story unfolds over a period of four days.

Late Chrysanthemums is screening at Metrograph as part of the Mikio Naruse: The World Betrays Us program

Kin, the most financially successful of the group, has become a ruthless moneylender and real estate speculator. Though materially secure, she is emotionally isolated and embittered, having sacrificed love and motherhood for independence. Her attempts to reconnect with the past, including a visit from a former lover and an encounter with an obsessive ex-client, only reaffirm her disillusionment.

Tamae and Tomi, both widowed, share a small home and rely on each other for emotional support. Tamae struggles with migraines that often prevent her from working as a maid,...

Above: 1980 Japanese poster for Apocalypse Now. Design by Eiko Ishioka, artwork by Haruo Takino.With Francis Ford Coppola’s long-gestated Megalopolis having premiered yesterday at Cannes, it's a good time to look back at the posters from his 60-year-long career. The only problem is that many posters for his films are either too well known or nothing to write home about. Like Coppola’s career itself, there are peaks and valleys—one of my very first posts for Notebook, almost exactly fifteen years ago, was about the gorgeous design for The Rain People (1969)—but a career retrospective of his posters seems like it might result in less than the sum of its parts. Yet of all his posters there are three rare Japanese designs that have always stood out as utterly extraordinary: two for Apocalypse Now (1979) and one for Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992).I’ve always seen these posters attributed to Eiko Ishioka,...