FUNimation Entertainment has announced the acquisition of three live action films including Yoji Yamada's Love and Honor, the final film in Yamada's samurai trilogy; Hirokazu Kore-Eda's first samurai movie Hana; and the Japanese/Mongolian co-production Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth. In 2006 FUNimation acquired another action-packed martial arts epic, Shinobi, a live action adaptation of the Kouga Ninja Scrolls novel that inspired both the Basilisk manga and anime series, and evidently Shinobi was successful enough to encourage FUNimation to acquire more live action period films.

Yoji Yamada is one of the most innovative directors to take on the samurai genre.  His Twilight Samurai (2002) earned him an Academy Award nomination (and won 12 Japanese Academy Awards) with its close examination of the different classes within the ranks of the samurai.  While still providing some masterful swordplay (the climatic duel is a masterpiece) Yamada managed to focus primarily on the character of his reluctant hero, a skillful, but low-ranking samurai, and meticulously detail his daily life and also chronicle what must be one of the most touching romances in the history of the genre.  Love and Honor (Bushi no Ichibun) is the final film in Yamada's samurai trilogy and a fitting capstone to a productive career in the movies, which began in 1958.

Hirokazu Kore-Eda's Hana (Hana Mori mo Naho) is the director's first samurai film and it also has a unique take on the genre -- it is a black comedy about a young samurai (played by former pop star Junichi Okada), who tries to find an alternative way to exact revenge for the death of his father, and in so doing begins to question the traditional samurai concepts of revenge and honor.

The third FUNimation acquisition Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth, a historical epic set in the 13th century, is another period film, but on an epic scale.  The $30 million Japanese/Mongolian co-production traces the amazing life story of the larger-than-life Mongol emperor.