

The Yen Family
1988-05-14 · 113 min · ★ 6.2
Set in Japan during the bubble era, this unique home comedy cheerfully and humorously depicts the daily life of a strange family that works together to accumulate a small amount of money, while mixing irony and satire.
Trailers are previews, not full movies.
No authorized playback source configured. Use the legal watch options below.
Production details
- Directors
- Yojiro Takita
- Production companies
- Fuji Television Network
- Countries
- Japan
- Status
- Released
Top Cast
Takeshi KagaHajime Kimura
Kaori MomoiNoriko Kimura
Hiromi IwasakiTerumi Kimura
Mitsunori IsakiTaro Kimura
Akira EmotoShinichi Amemiya
Midori KiuchiSayuri Amemiya
Akiko KazamiMitsu Amemiya
Hiroyuki KonishiMasashi Takakura, neighbor
Michiko ShimizuSayaka Takakura, Masashi's wife
Yoshi KatōTokijiro
Jun TataraUmekichi
Kōen OkumuraTakeyoshi
Mari TorigoeAshiro
Toshiya SakaiHirono
Yutaka IkejimaAssistant managerTitle information and images are supplied by TMDb. Explore our discovery guide for advice on comparing metadata and legal viewing options.
Where to watch
Availability provided by JustWatch via TMDb. Offers can change. Provider links are listed on TMDb; full playback requires a separately authorized source.
Availability not listed for this country.
Seasons & episodes
Recommendations

The Yamadas are a typical middle class Japanese family in urban Tokyo and this film shows us a variety of episodes of their lives. With tales that range from the humorous to the heartbreaking, we see this family cope with life's little conflicts, problems, and joys in their own way.

In the summer of 1978, a teenager and his group of friends face new challenges when their neighborhood roller-skating rink closes, forcing them to visit a different rink.

When a celebrated TV show host returns to his hometown in the South, his family is there to remind him that going home is no vacation!

As Bright Fields preps for its Mistletoe Ball, a broken ornament leads Zoe to a family secret, while Gaby finds herself at the mercy of new boss Mia.

Looking to adopt a child and unable to conceive a child of their own, the Morrisons' lives are turned upside down when a seven-year-old boy unexpectedly shows up on their doorstep.

Chang, a 16-year-old, Asian American, bets the high school basketball star that he can dunk by Homecoming. The bet leads 5' 8" Chang on a quest to learn to dunk—not only to impress his crush, Kristy, but to gain the respect of his high school peers too. But before he can rise up and truly throw one down, he'll have to reexamine everything he knows about himself, his friendships and his family.

A husband and wife have been married for 50 years. For her birthday, the husband asks the wife what she wants for her birthday present. She replies that she wants a divorce. The wife's divorce announcement sends the entire family into chaos.

When Michael McCann is thrown over by the woman he loves, he becomes something of a misanthrope and a miser, spending all of his spare money on collectible gold coins. Living in the same town is an affluent family with two sons: John and Tanny. Tanny's a wild boy, whom John cannot control, and one night he breaks into McCann's house, and steals the gold and disappears, which nearly confirms McCann's distrust of mankind. But then, a mysterious young woman dies in the snow outside McCann's house, and her small daughter makes her way to McCann's house and into McCann's life and heart.

A spell of time in the life of the five-piece Haruno family in rural Tochigi Prefecture. Yoshiko is not an ordinary housewife, instead working on an animated film project. Uncle Ayano, a successful music producer, is looking to get his head together after living in Tokyo. Meanwhile, Sachiko is concerned with why she seems to be followed by a giant version of herself. As the lazy days pass by, each member of the family is followed in a series of episodic vignettes.

Two boys beg their parents for a television set, nagging them until all patience is lost. The parents order the boys to be quiet and the boys do exactly that--refusing to utter a word. The boys' silence ultimately puts the whole neighborhood into turmoil.

The Loud family travel to Scotland and discover they are descendants of Scottish royalty as they move into their giant ancestral castle.

Linus is pushed to his limits when he learns Grandma is coming to visit and plans on ridding him of his childish security blanket.

Rudolf, a black stray cat, is suddenly separated from his beloved master. He unexpectedly wakes up in a long-distance truck that takes him to metropolis Tokyo. There, he meets Ippai-attena, a big boss cat feared by everyone in town. Unable to return home, Rudolf starts a life as a stray with Ippai-attena, but Ippai-attena isn't all that he seems to be.

Puppy mayhem turns the lives of newlywed Chihuahua parents Papi and Chloe upside down when their rambunctious, mischievous puppies present one challenge after another. But when their human owners end up in trouble, the tiny pups will stop at nothing to save them - because in good times and hard times, the family always sticks together. So Papi, Chloe and the puppies embark on a heroic adventure, proving once again that big heroes come in small packages.

Young tween Justin Yoder, who's known for his outgoing demeanor and wit despite being confined to a wheelchair, dreams to be like his athletic older brother and propels himself into the world of soapbox derby racing. It's a field he's sure he has a chance in. Unfortunately, he finds that because of his condition, not everyone is eager to see him compete.

A young girl tries to fit in with a clique of popular middle school girls after moving into the guest house of one of their homes.

After NBA star Kevin Durant switches talent with 16 year old Brian, the teenager becomes the star of his high school team, but Durant starts struggling and eventually learns an important lesson.

4 TV Episodes Spectacle!

When the mysterious Shiriri turns his parents into children, Shin-chan must trek across Japan to help return them to adult form.

"Cheaper by the Dozen", based on the real-life story of the Gilbreth family, follows them from Providence, Rhode Island, to Montclair, New Jersey, and details the amusing anecdotes found in large families.
Similar titles

The Yamadas are a typical middle class Japanese family in urban Tokyo and this film shows us a variety of episodes of their lives. With tales that range from the humorous to the heartbreaking, we see this family cope with life's little conflicts, problems, and joys in their own way.

A middle-aged husband of a younger woman finds her youth intimidating to the point that he cannot become aroused. His solution involves the introduction of his daughter's lover to his wife.

Tokyo engineer Kariya arrives on a primitive tropical island, where he interacts with the Futori clan, to drill a well to power a sugar mill.

A married woman and her lover murder her husband and dump his body into a well, but his ghost returns to haunt them as the local gossip intensifies.

Sanae is left a widow after her prestigious husband dies, but holds the proceeds of a million yen insurance policy. Being childless, her former in-laws have no objection to her return to her own family.

After the closure of a coal mine leaves her husband unemployed, Fumiko travels from Kyushu to Kyoto with her daughter Kimiko, and they become hostesses at a cabaret.

Two boys beg their parents for a television set, nagging them until all patience is lost. The parents order the boys to be quiet and the boys do exactly that--refusing to utter a word. The boys' silence ultimately puts the whole neighborhood into turmoil.

Summoned by his dying father, Miyagi returns to his homeland of Okinawa, with Daniel, after a 40-year exile. There he must confront Yukie, the love of his youth, and Sato, his former best friend turned vengeful rival. Sato is bent on a fight to the death, even if it means the destruction of their village. Daniel finds his own love in Yukia's niece, Kumiko, and his own enemy in Sato's nephew, the vicious Chozen. Now, far away from the tournaments, cheering crowds and safety of home, Daniel will face his greatest challenge ever when the cost of honor is life itself.

Masa hires rental actress and aspiring dancer, Kanako, to pose as his fiancée to impress his estranged, terminally-ill father. But as his father's death delays, Masa is forced to confront the spiraling web of lies and to learn to follow his heart.

An aging foundry patriarch, gripped by terror of nuclear annihilation, tries to uproot his family to Brazil. When they petition to have him declared incompetent, a family-court counselor witnesses his obsession slide into ruin—and asks whether ignoring the atomic threat is any saner.

A teenager named Noriko Shimabara runs away from her family in Toyokawa, to meet Kumiko, the leader of an Internet BBS, Haikyo.com. She becomes involved with Kumiko's family circle, which grows darker after the mass suicide of 54 high school girls.

Toru grew up in alpine countryside around Mount Tate. As a child, he resented the yearly trek up the mountain with his father to prepare their mountain hut for the summer season of climbers. When Toru grows up, he leaves his hometown and enters the working world as a stock trader. One day, Toru receives word that his father has passed away. He returns to Mount Tate once again, and becomes conscious of a new calling. But, does Toru have what it takes to follow in his father’s footsteps?

Shortly after moving to the suburbs, the Kobayashis start to come undone. Convinced a family curse is at the root of their erratic behavior, the man of the house takes it upon himself to course-correct before it takes the last of their sanity.

This title was completed in 1984 and opened in 2014.

On the surface, the Kyobashis appear to be a happy family. Despite a family agreement that they are all open with each other, the entire household knows the opposite is true.

Yuichi Koga is an upper-class business executive, running his own adult video company, and living a successful life with his wife and daughter. Outwardly, his family seems really happy, but in reality Yuichi enjoys sex with everyone but his wife Chikako. One day, he gets a phone call from a woman named Sanae, an old elementary school classmate of his.

A Japanese family is torn apart by the tensions of an avoidable nuclear world war between the superpowers.

A husband and wife have been married for 50 years. For her birthday, the husband asks the wife what she wants for her birthday present. She replies that she wants a divorce. The wife's divorce announcement sends the entire family into chaos.

Sora and Umi (both played by Lee Tae-kyung) who were born to a Japanese father and a Korean mother and raised in South Korea. Sora now lives in Shanghai and works as an illustrator. When she meets a Japanese guy named Mochizuki, they become close. This is when her sibling Umi visits. Umi was born inter-sex and had undergone gender reassignment surgery to become a woman. Umi encourages Sora and Mochizuki to fall in love, but Sora becomes mentally unstable.

The Rinkaiji family, by all appearances, is a well-to-do Japanese family. The father, Nariyuki, works in an elite corporation, which gives his wife Yoshiko status in their suburban neighborhood. But the daughter Sugina, who herself has secretly stopped going to school because she is being bullied. One day, they discover that Nariyuki has quit his job. As Nariyuki decides to find a new job along with Sugina, Yoshiko, a firm believer in a life based on the company, soon finds her world falling apart.