Tengu (2009)

David (Ted Taylor) comes to Japan for one week to study traditional legends. He is supposed to meet Professor Ozawa, a leading expert in the field. But when he arrives, he gets picked up by Ozawa's two female assistants, Sanae (Mimori Sento) and Manami (Sakiko Ikegami). They bring him to a traditional guest-house and accompany him during his stay. A strange man in the bath house (Kan Mikami) tells David about the local Tengu legend. Tengu are a class of well known monster-spirits with a long nose and a red face who live in the forests and mountains of Japan. David is immediately fascinated. But the more he finds our about the Tengu, the more he is drawn into his own past life. As a matter of fact, some Tengu legends can be connected to shipwrecked foreigners who were forced to live in hiding in the mountains during Japan's Sakyoku (closed country) period (1637-1853). Ultimately, "Tengu" is the story of a Westerner who becomes the origin of a famous Japanese legend.