A New Love in Tokyo

Our 2K Restoration of A New Love in Tokyo sold out opening night at Metrograph, and at Suns Cinemas in Washington D.C.! The screening in Los Angeles at American Cinematheque was riotous, so get tickets while you still can for what Ben Kenigsberg at The New York Times called “...erotica that finds room for real sweetness and intellectual pretensions along with its kink.”

Tickets!

A New Love in Tokyo continues screening at Metrograph (New York, NY) Beacon Cinema (Seattle, WA), opens tomorrow at Plaza Theatre (Atlanta, GA), and Suns Cinema (Washington, DC), as well as American Cinematheque in LA on the 25th. It will expand into other markets throughout the year.

January 27, 28, 29, Feb 2, 5 - Metrograph (New York) - Tickets

January 27 - Beacon Cinema (Seattle, WA) - Tickets

January 28, 31 - Suns (Washington D.C.) - Sold Out

January 28, 30, 31, February 1, 4 - Plaza Theatre (Atlanta, GA) - Tickets

February 12 - Hard Light Cinema (Richmond, VA) - Tickets

Watch the trailer! The reviews on Letterboxd have also been great—it’s a real pleasure to see how much fun you’re all having with it! Rewatching it today, my main takeaway is that we should be buying our friends more flowers.

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Synopsis: Ayumi (Reiko Kataoka) juggles between her work as a call-girl and a life with a boyfriend unable to get into college. Soon, she meets Rei (Sawa Suzuki), a seasoned dominatrix aspiring to become a theatre actor, who spends her free time rehearsing with a troupe that blurs the line between the stage and the bedroom. At the terminus of the Japanese Bubble era, brilliantly evoked here by neon-lit streets and chic interiors, both women bring us into their nocturnal orbit: a life dedicated to the pursuit of pleasure, camaraderie and the joys of hanging out in the thriving, horny districts of Shinjuku and Shibuya.

Marketed in some territories as a sequel to Ryu Murakami’s moody Tokyo Decadence (1992), Banmei Takahashi’s A New Love in Tokyo unfolds as its tonal opposite: less a somber sexploitation film than an unexpectedly sex-positive workplace comedy ripe for rediscovery. Based on a book of essays by Kei Shimamoto that brings the reader into a bustling erotic underworld, the film is also notable for featuring cult photographer Nobuyoshi Araki as one of its key collaborator. A glimpse into a bygone era of Japanese eroticism, A New Love in Tokyo provided pinku, V-cinema and Director’s Company veteran Banmei Takahashi (Door, Door II) with a bridge towards a broader range of human experience and pathos.

• Did you catch our acquisitions announcement in Variety for Korean classic Take Care of My Cat starring Bae Doona in one of her first roles? Stay tuned for our 25th Anniversary re-release later this year!

• Everyone’s favourite Cleaners is also now on the shelf at the Letterboxd Videostore

• Kisapmata screens at the Pickford Film Center in Bellingham, WA on February. Get tickets here.

• Our release of early Yoshimitsu Morita pinku films Pink Cut: Love Me Hard, Love Me Deep and Top Stripper is back in stock!

• This month, Bye Bye Love hits home video for the first time, presented in 2K with interviews from director Isao Fujisawa and programmer / director of Looking For An Angel Akihiro Suzuki.

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Working on these films opened up a whole new understanding of Japanese queer film tradition, and we were guided on this journey by historians Liz Purchell and Dakota Noot. Dakota also recently covered our release of Top Stripper and Pink Cut:Love Me Hard, Love Me Deep on Two in the Pinku which is almost as long as watching both films 😉 Thank you everyone who picked up a copy—sorry to keep you waiting on the restock but it’s in the works!

• We’re in the running for Best Annual Slate from a Small-slate Boutique Label at the Shelf Shock Rewind 2025 Awards! This is huge for us, and we hope you’ll vote for us. We’re small, completely self-financed, and we’re just out here hoping the films we’re working on resonate with you. In 2025, we released 15 films over 11 editions and had our first UHD release with Lino Brocka’s Bona. Check out our full slate here, and write us into any category you’d like!

Vote for us!

While we’ve got a lot of new ideas and plans for 2026, our focus is, as always, on the curation and presentation. When we’re asked how we choose our films, the short and most honest answer is that we like them; that life is short and we can only work on films that make our heart sing. Thank you for trusting us, especially with every blind Blu-ray buys and movie tickets. We won’t let you down; this year is going to be spectaular.