Haven't seen that many japanese movies as it's difficult to find DVDs with English subtitles in Japan. I saw Brother- a beat Takeshi film. It was OK but suffered from a fairly weak cast and bad acting.
[url]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0222851/[/url]
[img]http://media.collegepublisher.com/media/paper872/stills/42ba2be6e868f-97-1.jpg[/img]
I have also seen Tampopo- an early Ken Watanabe effort- It's a story about a couple of truck drivers that help a ramen shop owner improve her noodles. Fairly slow-paced but good if you like Watanabe.
[url]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092048/[/url]
[img]http://deadon.files.wordpress.com/2007/02/tampopo.gif[/img]