Street of Shame
In this heartbreaking drama, five women toil in Tokyo’s red-light district as sex workers, all reaching toward different dreams and hopes. Yet, each find those dreams shattered by the socioeconomic realities surrounding them. Street of Shame was so cutting and popular that some said it brought about the antiprostitution law passed in Japan just a few months later. For his final film, Kenji Mizoguchi brought a lifetime of experience to bear.
Director: Kenji Mizoguchi. Country: Japan. Released: 1956. Length: 85 min. Format: DCP. Language: Japanese with English subtitles. Image courtesy of Janus Films.
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://nmaamatinees.eventive.org/schedule/69373fe6139ea1a7f5d743d7. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Assisted listening devices. Captioning. Wheelchair accessible.
Wednesday, February 11, 2026, 2:00 PM – 3:45 PM.
Resurrection
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With his senses-ravishing third feature, visionary director Bi Gan (Kaili Blues, Long Day’s Journey into Night) takes his deepest plunge yet into the realm of pure cinematic dreamscape.
In a world where humans have forsaken dreams in exchange for immortality, a dreaming monster (Jackson Yee) embarks on a shape-shifting odyssey. Through illusion, beauty, and terror, the journey takes him across the twentieth century and to the end of time. The film’s five dazzlingly imagined chapters unfold in varying styles that encompass everything from silent-cinema expressionism to film noir to a delirious vampire love story shot in one of Bi’s signature long takes. Resurrection is a work of breathtaking imagination in which cinema is the ultimate portal to the unconscious mind. Description adapted from Janus Films.
Director: Bi Gan. Countries: China, France. Released: 2025. Length: 160 min. Format: DCP. Language: Mandarin with English subtitles. Image courtesy of Janus Films.
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://icymi.eventive.org/films. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Captioning. Assisted listening devices. Wheelchair accessible.
Sunday, February 15, 2026, 2:00 PM – 4:45 PM.
Left-Handed Girl
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Co-written and co-produced by Oscar winner Sean Baker (Anora), Shih-Ching Tsou’s debut feature is the story of a single mother and her two daughters who move from the countryside to Taipei to open a food stall in a busy night market. As they struggle to adapt to their new environment, three generations of family secrets begin to unravel when the left-handed, youngest daughter is told by her grandfather not to use her “devil hand.” Shot entirely on iPhones, Left-Handed Girl is a ravishing, hyperkinetic, neon-smeared portrait of bustling nighttime Taipei, and according to Ang Lee, “a precious viewing experience in times like these.”
Intended for mature audiences.
Director: Shih-Ching Tsou. Regions: Taiwan, United States, United Kingdom, France. Released: 2025. Length: 109 min. Format: DCP. Language: Mandarin and Taiwanese Hokkien with English subtitles. Image courtesy of Netflix.
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://icymi.eventive.org/films. Categories: Films. After Five. Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Captioning. Assisted listening devices.
Friday, February 20, 2026, 7:00 PM – 8:45 PM.
Kokuho
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Introduced by University of Maryland professor Dr. Jyana Browne, an expert on Japanese performance traditions.
Japan’s biggest ever box office hit begins in 1964 in Nagasaki. When 14-year-old Kikuo’s yakuza gangster father is murdered, a famous Kabuki actor takes him under his wing. Along with the actor’s only son Shunsuke, Kikuo devotes his life to this demanding form of traditional theater. The film follows the two men over the decades, from wild success to abject failure, from brotherhood to betrayal, as they push one another to become the greatest living masters of the art.
Epic in scale and sumptuously beautiful, Lee Sang-il's film is about the price of sacrificing everything for one’s art, a fascinating look behind the scenes of this ancient form of theater, and “a stunning tale of art, ambition, and bloodlines” (Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter).
Directed by: Lee Sang-il. Country: Japan. Released: 2025. Length: 175 min. Format: DCP. Language: Japanese with English subtitles. …
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://icymi.eventive.org/films. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Captioning. Assisted listening devices.
Sunday, March 1, 2026, 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
Magellan
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In this historical drama, acclaimed Filipino filmmaker Lav Diaz retells the story of Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan’s 16th-century voyage to Southeast Asia. But this retelling radically upends traditional European narratives of conquest.
Diaz foregrounds the stories of the people Magellan sought to colonize—especially his personal slave, a Malay named Enrique. The film reveals how Magellan’s obsession with power led to mutiny, rebellion, and ultimately an apocalyptic clash between two societies previously unknown to each other.
Meanwhile, this tale of human strife contrasts with “visually intoxicating, at times gasp-out-loud ravishing” cinematography (The New York Times) as Diaz highlights the otherworldly beauty of the Malay Archipelago.
Intended for mature audiences.
Director: Lav Diaz. Regions: Portugal, Spain, Philippines, France, Taiwan. Released: 2025. Length: 163 min. Format: DCP. Languages: Portuguese, Spanish, Cebuano, and French with English subtitles. Image…
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://icymi.eventive.org/films. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Captioning. Wheelchair accessible. Assisted listening devices.
Sunday, March 8, 2026, 2:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
Lady Snowblood
Gory revenge is raised to the level of visual poetry in Toshiya Fujita’s stunning Lady Snowblood, set in late nineteenth-century Japan. A major inspiration for Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill saga, this endlessly inventive film charts a young woman’s single-minded path of vengeance after her parents die at the hands of a gang of brutal criminals. Fujita creates a wildly entertaining action film of remarkable craft—an effortless balancing act between beauty and violence. Description adapted from Janus Films.
Director: Toshiya Fujita. Country: Japan. Released: 1973. Length: 97 min. Format: DCP. Language: Japanese with English subtitles. Image courtesy of Janus Films.
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://nmaamatinees.eventive.org/schedule/6949664f20c97b81d9ac4631. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Captioning. Assisted listening devices.
Wednesday, March 11, 2026, 2:00 PM – 3:45 PM.
Rashomon
A riveting psychological thriller that investigates the nature of truth and the meaning of justice, Rashomon is widely considered one of the greatest films ever made. Four people give different accounts of a man’s murder and the rape of his wife, which director Akira Kurosawa presents with striking imagery and an ingenious use of flashbacks. This eloquent masterwork and international sensation revolutionized film language and introduced Japanese cinema—and a commanding new star by the name of Toshiro Mifune—to the Western world. Description courtesy of Janus Films.
Director: Akira Kurosawa. Country: Japan. Released: 1950. Length: 88 min. Format: DCP. Language: Japanese with English subtitles. Image courtesy of Janus Films.
Venue: Asian Art Museum, West Building. Building: West Building. Event Location: Meyer Auditorium. Cost: Free. Register in advance (recommended). Get Tickets/Register: https://nmaamatinees.eventive.org/films/69496cc4335ee12f50d1cf66. Categories: Films. Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Assisted listening devices. Captioning.
Wednesday, April 8, 2026, 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM.