In 1867 Japan at the end of the shogunate, the samurai and nobles struggle to retain dominance, while the peasants begin a rise to power.  Near the turbulent end of the Edo era, a man returning to Japan after exile in America searches for his wife and becomes swept up in the current of revolution in this incisive period drama from the great Shohei Imamura.  This historical epic is Imamura Shohei’s most ambitious project to date and opened to rave reviews. The story of a peasant riot during the political chaos that preceded the Meiji Restoration in nineteenth century Japan is a vivid and spectacular period piece.