Directed by Shohei Imamura • 1981 • Japan
Starring Shigeru Izumiya, Kaori Momoi, Masao Kusakari

In the 1860s, near the turbulent end of the Edo era, Genji (Shigeru Izumiya), a peasant returning to Japan after six years of exile in America, searches for his wife and becomes swept up in the current of revolution. EIJANAIKA (a.k.a. WHY NOT?) is a teeming, kaleidoscopic period epic from Shohei Imamura. As usual, the director crafts a bottom-up view of Japanese society, painting a vigorous portrait of epochal upheaval through the eyes of those history often overlooks.