Ya, during the tiasho period, the emperor was slightly mentally uh... weak? So there was less repression and more grass roots movements. Before and after that there was more repression and a lot of leftists were put in jail, leading up to WW2.

During the occupation, the US let out the jailed thought criminals (aka socialists/communists) and jailed the war criminals. Suddenly, like china, japan was going communist, and America freaked out, so they rejailed the lefties and let out the war criminals (this is called "the reverse occupation") and pumped a ton of money into Japan - that's why the 1960s - 80s in Japan was good times; 90s was lost decade.

Anyway, I think it was the late 1800s to the 1930s had a LOT of assassinations. Like students (mostly nationalist) using swords to cut down politicians, quite literally.

1918 had a rice riots issue. They imported rice from the US and stuff, and it's really interesting how the locals would like mark the rice sellers who price gouged the locals, and who local rice sellers were. They then bussed in mobs from outside the area to destroy the price gouging sellers. For riots, they were extremely organized.

Anyway, the time during the rice riots had weak top-down rule and lots of grassroots movements growing.

Edit: forgot to add, Japan dug itself out of the 1850s unfair treaties act, a lot like cartage did with Rome. Japan basically informally created a system of indentured servitude in it's silk factories. So factory people would go into the mountains and wine and dine poor families and be like "we'll pay you cash money to let us take care of your daughter for a couple years" and have them sign a contract. They'd teach the daughter how to make silk. If she was slow or messed up production she could get fined. however, if she was amazing she could make bank. Oh! The Nomugi Pass; Original title: Ah! Nomugi toge 1979 2h 34m) outlines this really well. The story of the silk industry and the young girls who worked as silk spinners in the early 1900's in Japan)

Japan took this money and built up their military, bought a few ships from Britain, and that brought in the Meiji reformation as Japan became a super power after dealing with the Chinese navy in the 1890s and absolutely wrecking Russia's Navy around 1905.) Nice breakdown: video

That's the environment this movie takes place in.

Anyway, I think it was the late 1800s to the 1930s had a LOT of assassinations. Like students (mostly nationalist) using swords to cut down politicians, quite literally.

You flirt. You always know what to say. ;)

Interesting stuff, thanks! Any other movies you'd recommend along those lines? I've been trying to build up a collection of content that includes class struggle and revolution ever since I became aware of how overwhelmingly blatant it's been erased/downplayed from popular media.

Nothing directly, but it's a really interesting time period.

Here are some Taisho period pieces:
Anarchist from Colony
Ballad of Orin
A Chaos of Flowers
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – To the Hashira Training
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – To the Swordsmith Village
Eros + Massacre
The Go Masters
Hachik? Monogatari
Her Brother
Kagero-za
The Love of Sumako the Actress
Onimasa
Sakura Wars: The Movie
September 1923 (film)
Spring Snow (film)
T?ki Rakujitsu
Untamed (1957 film)
Yellow Fangs
Yumeji
Zigeunerweisen (film)

Other recommendations:
The Red Peony Gambler
series from the 1960s is set in the Meiji period. Some or all of the films are available on the Internet Archive

I Was Born, But... (1932)


The Twilight Samurai
Imprint (2006)

THE TAISHO TRILOGY
After being effectively exiled from the Japanese movie studios after repeatedly making wildly inspired genre films that purposefully go off the rails into abstracted violence, theatrical artifice, and pure beauty, director Seijun Suzuki made his triumphant comeback with three sumptuous, strange and decadent films set in the Taisho era (1912 – 1926) of a rapidly modernizing Japan.

High and Low (1963) - Japan's post-war class struggles in film

Dersu Uzala

Akira Kurosawa's Unique Relationship to Russia and the Creation of his Only Non-Japanese Film: Dersu Uzala https://youtu.be/B4bIALn4iWA (kurosawa and russia)

The Bad Sleep Well
A vengeful young man marries the daughter of a corrupt industrialist in order to seek justice for his father's suicide.

I think you could try looking up these ppl by name and see if there are any related movies:

Inejir? Asanuma

Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Inejir?_Asanuma
Asanuma was assassinated with a wakizashi, a traditional short sword, by far-right ultranationalist Otoya Yamaguchi while speaking in a televised political ...

Otoya Yamaguchi

Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Otoya_Yamaguchi
Yamaguchi rushed the stage and stabbed Asanuma with a wakizashi-like short sword while Asanuma was participating in a televised election debate at Hibiya Public ...

Hell yeah, dude! Thankya! I'll see what I can find. Yandex.ru has been super helpful lately since they don't give a shit about DMCA takedowns.?