Japan Synopsis
“To save her family a girl must become a boy”
After the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the restriction of women in public life, a pre-teen girl is forced to masquerade as a boy in order to find work to support her mother and grandmother.
Other Titles From Hubert Bals Fund
The 2005–2007 Japan Window
Osama holds position #162 of 364 Japan films in the 2005–2007 window, below highlighted by audience rating.
The 2000s Japan Landscape
2006 was the decade’s peak output year for Japan — 134 titles released, including Osama. Bars below show how the 2000s stacked up year by year (1020 total).
Position in Catalog
Released alongside 133 other Japan films in 2006.
The 1791st Japan title from Japan we index (earliest catalogued entry: 1899).
Our Japan catalog contains 4,579 titles in total (2,908 films).
Audience Engagement
97 audience reviews — more than 76% of Japan films in our index.
Review volume (76th percentile) outruns trending popularity (55th) — a durable title with sustained audience attention.
Thematic Fingerprint
Tags on Osama, grouped by how common each theme is across the full Asian catalog. Rare tags are more distinctive signals.
- child · 5
- taliban · 4
- women and society · 3
- radical islam · 3
- girl · 3
- religious education · 2
- sharia law · 2
- mother and daughter · 2
- girl disguised as boy · 1
- survive · 1
- veiled woman · 1
- working girl · 1
- islamic studies · 1
- gender discrimination · 1
- religious extremism · 1
- mother daughter relationship · 17
- muslim · 9
- afghanistan · 8
- forced marriage · 6
Reception Benchmarks
Ranked #2,130 of 4,579 Japan films indexed here (53rd percentile by TMDB audience score).
Among Japan Drama productions specifically: #936 of 1,933 (top 48%).
Production Details
| Primary Country | Japan |
|---|---|
| All Production Countries | Afghanistan, Iran, Ireland, Netherlands, Japan |
| Original Language | Ps |
| Spoken Languages | French, English, Pushto, Persian, Hungarian |
| Production Companies | Hubert Bals Fund, NHK, LeBrocquy Fraser Productions, Barmak Film |
| Runtime | 1h 23m |
| Release Date | February 2, 2006 |
| IMDb | tt0368913 |