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Movies

The Silent Era

The first film produced in Japan was the short documentary Geisha No Teodori in June of 1899.

The first Japanese performer to appear in a film professionally was the dancer/actress Tokuko Nagai Takagi, who appeared in four shorts for the American-based Thanhouser Company between 1911 and 1914 (source).

Most Japanese cinema theatres at the time employed benshi, narrators whose dramatic readings accompanied the film and its musical score which, like in the West, was often performed live.

The 1923 earthquake, the Allied bombing of Tokyo during World War II, as well as the natural effects of time and Japan's humidity on the then more fragile filmstock have all resulted in a great dearth of surviving films from this period.

Some of the most discussed silent films from Japan are those of Kenji Mizoguchi, whose later works (e.g., The Life of Oharu) are still highly regarded today.

A study of the "gendaigeki" (contemporary/modern film drama) and writing for film in Japan in the 1910s to early 1920s, with select translations of scripts (complete as well as excerpts) is available in "Writing in Light: The Silent Scenario and the Japanese Pure Film Movement" (Joanne Bernardi, Wayne State University Press, 2001).

The 1930s

Unlike Hollywood, silent films were still being produced in Japan well into the 1930s. Notable talkies of this period include Mizoguchi's Sisters of the Gion and Osaka Elegy (both 1936). With increasing censorship, the left-leaning tendency films of directors such as Daisuke Ito come under attack.

The 1940s

Akira Kurosawa makes his feature film debut with Sugata Sanshiro in 1943. With the SCAP occupation following the end of WWII, Japan is exposed to over a decade's worth of American animation that had been banned under the war-time government.

The 1950s

The Akira Kurosawa-directed The Seven Samurai is released in 1954, the same year as Gojira, known to the West (and to Japan from its first sequel on) as Godzilla. Over ten minutes of footage is cut from Godzilla by its American distributor, mostly of wounded civilians in burning cities, evoking the recent Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Daikaiju films were a mainstay of Japanese cinema for well into the 1970s, and are still being made today. Kurosawa directs Rashomon (1950).

Kenji Mizoguchi directs The Life of Oharu (Saikaku Ichidai Onna, 1952), Ugetsu (Ugetsu Monogatari, 1953) and Sansho the Bailiff (Sansho Dayu, 1954). ggt Mikio Naruse directs Repast (1950), Late Chrysanthemums (1954) and Floating Clouds (1955).

Yasujiro Ozu directs Tokyo Story (Tokyo monogatari) (1953) and Good Morning (Ohayo) (1959). Many have argued that Tokyo Story is the greatest film ever made, surpassing even Citizen Kane.

The 1960s

Technicolor makes its mark. Kon Ichikawa captures the watershed 1964 Olympics in his three-hour documentary Tokyo Olympiad (Tokyo Orimpikku; 1965). Nikkatsu fires Suzuki Seijun for "making films that don't make any sense and don't make any money" after his surrealist yakuza flick Branded to Kill (1967).

Osamu Tezuka's Tetsuwan Atomu introduces anime to television and gives the world Astro Boy in 1963.

Nagisa Oshima, Kaneto Shindo, and Shohei Imamura emerge as major filmmakers during the decade.

Hiroshi Teshigahara's Woman in the Dunes (1964) takes the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and is nominated for Best Director and Best Foreign Language Film Oscars. Masaki Kobayashi's Kwaidan (1965) also picks up the Special Jury Prize at Cannes.

The 1970s

Nagisa Oshima directs Ai no koriida (In the Realm of the Senses; 1976), a World War I period piece about Abe Sada. Staunchly anti-censorship, he insists the film contain hardcore pornographic material; as a result the exposed film must be shipped to France for processing, and an uncut version of the film has still, to this day, never been shown in Japan. However, the pink film industry became the stepping stone for young independent filmmakers of Japan.

The 1980s

Hayao Miyazaki adapts his manga Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind (Kaze no tani no Naushika) into a feature film (an anime of the same name) in 1984. Katsuhiro Otomo adapts his manga Akira into a feature-length anime in 1988. New anime movies are run every summer and winter with characters from popular TV anime. Shohei Imamura wins the Golden Palm at Cannes for Narayama Bushiko (1983) (Ballad of Narayama; 1982).

The 1990s

Shohei Imamura again wins the Golden Palm (shared with Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami), this time for Unagi (The Eel; 1997), joining Alf Sjöberg, Francis Ford Coppola and Bille August as only the fourth two-time recipient. Takeshi Kitano emerges as a significant filmmaker with works such as Sonatine (1993), Kids Return (1996) and Hana-Bi (1997), which was given the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. Not to forget, Takashi Miike makes up to 50 films in a decade, building up an impressive portfolio with titles such as, Audition (1999), Dead or Alive (1999) and Bird People of China (1998). Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Hirokazu Koreeda both launch acclaimed careers.

Contemporary (2000 and after)

Hayao Miyazaki comes out of retirement to direct Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi; 2001), breaking Japanese box office records and winning the U.S. Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. In 2002, Dolls is released, followed by a high-budget remake, Zatoichi in 2003, both directed and written by Takeshi Kitano. The horror films Ringu and Ju-on: The Grudge are remade in English and met with commercial success. In 2005, director Seijun Suzuki made his 56th film, Princess Raccoon. Hirokazu Koreeda proclaims film festival awards around the world with two of his films Distance and Nobody Knows.

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