A Woman's Skin

In the years before World War II, a penniless Japanese child is torn from her family to work as a maid in a geisha house.

During the Edo Period, a noblewoman's banishment for her love affair with a lowly page signals the beginning of her inexorable fall.

Because of her past, 17-year-old Rio lives her days filling the emptiness in her heart with money—until one day, she meets a university professor named Kouki and falls in love.

Young teen girl Xiu Xiu is sent away to a remote corner of the Sichuan steppes for manual labor in 1975 (sending young people to there was a part of Cultural Revolution in China). A year later, she agrees to go to even more remote spot with a Tibetan saddle tramp Lao Jin to learn horse herding.

An unhappy young woman from an abusive family is married off to a fearsome and chilly army commander. But the two learn more about each other, love may have a chance.

Down-on-his-luck veteran Tsugumo Hanshirō enters the courtyard of the prosperous House of Iyi. Unemployed, and with no family, he hopes to find a place to commit seppuku—and a worthy second to deliver the coup de grâce in his suicide ritual. The senior counselor for the Iyi clan questions the ronin’s resolve and integrity, suspecting Hanshirō of seeking charity rather than an honorable end. What follows is a pair of interlocking stories which lay bare the difference between honor and respect, and promises to examine the legendary foundations of the Samurai code.