In depth · Film
Tokyo on film: from Tokyo Story to Perfect Days
Tokyo has been filmed from a tatami-level camera and from the 52nd floor, as a city of lonely hotel bars, Christmas Eve miracles, comets and quiet daily routines. Six films to watch before you go, with their official trailers and the places you can find.
Updated October 2026
Tokyo Story (1953)
Yasujirō Ozu’s masterpiece follows an elderly couple who travel to Tokyo to visit their grown-up children, who are too busy to spend time with them. Shot from Ozu’s low, still camera, it is one of the most admired films ever made, and it shows the city rebuilding in the years after the war.
Lost in Translation (2003)
Sofia Coppola’s film about two Americans adrift in Tokyo was shot largely at the Park Hyatt Tokyo, whose New York Bar, on the 52nd floor of Shinjuku Park Tower, became one of the city’s best-known bars. The hotel reopened on 9 December 2025 after its renovation. We found no trailer on the studio’s or distributor’s own channel, so none is shown here.
The New York Bar Park Hyatt Tokyo
Tokyo Godfathers (2003)
Satoshi Kon’s animated film begins on Christmas Eve, when three homeless friends find a baby abandoned in the snow and set out across Tokyo to find its parents: a story of chance and kindness, and a fine one for the season.
Your Name (2016)
Makoto Shinkai’s animated film about a Tokyo boy and a country girl who wake up in each other’s lives drew visitors to the city’s real places, above all a flight of stone stairs below a small shrine in Yotsuya.
Shoplifters (2018)
Hirokazu Kore-eda’s film about a family living by petty theft in a cramped house in Tokyo won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2018: a tender, unsentimental portrait of the city’s other side.
Perfect Days (2023)
Wim Wenders’ film follows Hirayama, a man who cleans Shibuya’s public toilets, through his quiet, ordered days: cassette tapes in the van, a paperback at night, the light through the trees. Kōji Yakusho won Best Actor at Cannes in 2023, and the film’s architect-designed toilets in Shibuya have become small destinations in their own right.
Our advice
Our advice: watch Tokyo Story and Perfect Days before you go, one after the other; then take a drink in the New York Bar at dusk, and walk through Shibuya the next morning.
Questions and answers
Where was Lost in Translation filmed?
Largely at the Park Hyatt Tokyo in Shinjuku, including its New York Bar.
Which film is set at Christmas in Tokyo?
Satoshi Kon’s Tokyo Godfathers (2003) begins on Christmas Eve.
Trailers play from YouTube in its privacy-enhanced mode, only from the studios’ and distributors’ own channels (checked 30 October 2026).