This article examines the relationship between the cultural imagination of disasters and the representation of Zainichi Koreans in Japanese cinema. Focusing on the depiction of earthquakes in film, it situates the 1995 Great Hanshin–Awaji Earthquake as a turning point in Japanese society and analyzes it alongside the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake and the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake. The Great Kantō Earthquake is inseparable from the historical event of the massacre of Koreans, demonstrating how disaster memories have been intertwined with ethnic discrimination and exclusion. While the Great Hanshin–Awaji Earthquake occurred during a period when the discourse of multicultural coexistence was gaining attention in Japan, it was also followed by the resurgence of exclusionary narratives toward foreigners and minorities. This paper focuses particularly on Japanese films produced since the 2020s that feature Zainichi Korean characters. By analyzing how these films portray the experiences and perspectives of Zainichi Koreans in relation to disasters, the study explores how the memory of catastrophe intersects with the social positioning of ethnic minorities in Japan and reconsiders the cultural imagination of a post–disaster society.