It Is a Long Walk (長崎ぶらぶら節), Yukio Fukamachi, 2000

Screen icon Sayuri Yoshinaga stars in this historical melodrama about geishas in the southern city of Nagasaki set during the 1920s. Though she was sold to a geisha house at a young age, Aihara (Yoshinaga) has since become a master samisen player and woman of great elegance. Though not especially rich, she doles out money to street kids, in particular, a pretty young flower vendor named Oyuki, who becomes Aiharas godchild of sorts. Yet when a geisha (Reiko Takashima) from a rival redlight district insults Aihara and her brethren, she fights back. Soon an allout geisha war looms. Dapper businessman and amateur scholar Tojiro Koga (Tetsuya Watari) appears on the scene and defuses tempers suggesting that differences be settled through a competition of artistic abilities. Smitten with her talent and mature beauty, Koga invites Aihara to record Nagasaki folk songs before they disappear forever.