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• Fukasaku Kinji
  Kinji Fukasaku
  was a Japanese film actor, screenwriter, and best known as a celebrated and innovative filmmaker. He was born in Mito, Ibaraki, Japan, and died in Tokyo, from prostate cancer...
  
  
• Fukuda Jun
  Jun Fukuda
  , was a Japanese director. He was born in Manchuria. He has directed dozens of films, perhaps best known for his contributions to the Godzilla film series in the 1970s...
  
  
• Furuhata Yasuo
• Furumaya Tomoyuki

H

• Hamano Sachi
  Sachi Hamano
  aka and , is a Japanese film director. She is the most prolific and written-about female pink film director.-Life and career:Sachi Hamano was born as Sachiko Suzuki in Tokushima Prefecture on March 19, 1948. While in high school, Hamano decided she wanted to become a film director...
  
  
• Susumu Hani
• Masato Harada
• Yasuharu Hasebe
• Ryōsuke Hashiguchi
  Ryōsuke Hashiguchi
  is a Japanese film director particularly known for taking up gay subjects. He won the award for Best Director at the 24th Yokohama Film Festival for Hush! and at the 33rd Hochi Film Award for Gururi no koto...
  
  
• Higuchi Shinji
  Shinji Higuchi
  is a storyboard artist and is one of the top special effects wizards in Japan, best known for his work on the Heisei Gamera Trilogy. He works on both anime and tokusatsu projects.-Biography:...
  
  
• Hideyuki Hirayama
• Honda Ishirō
  Ishiro Honda
  Ishirō Honda , sometimes miscredited in foreign releases as "Inoshiro Honda", was a Japanese film director...
  
  

I

• Ichikawa Kon
  Kon Ichikawa
  was a Japanese film director.-Early life and career:Ichikawa was born in Ise, Mie Prefecture. In the 1930s Ichikawa attended a technical school in Osaka. Upon graduation, in 1933, he found a job with a local rental film studio, J.O. Studio, in their animation department...
  
  
• Iimura Takahiko
• Ikejima Yutaka
  Yutaka Ikejima
  is a Japanese film director, actor, and producer. Considered the most successful filmmaker in the pink film genre in the 2000s, his films are popular with traditional pink film audiences, fans of cinema, and with critics. Because of his prolific contributions to the pink film he has earned the...
  
  
• Imamura Shōhei
  Shohei Imamura
  was a Japanese film director. Imamura was the first Japanese director to win two Palme d'Or awards.His eldest son Daisuke Tengan is also a script writer and film director, and worked on the screenplays to Imamura's filmsThe Eel , Dr...
  
  
• Imaoka Shinji
  Shinji Imaoka
  aka is a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor. He is one of a group of pink film directors of the 2000s known collectively as the .-Life and career:...
  
  
• Inoue Haruo
  Haruo Inoue
  Haruo Inoue Inoue Haruo, born January 3, 1963 in Nara, Japan. Inoue is a Japanese film director artist.-Life and career:In 1991, Haruo Inoue started his career by directing a short film titled "An Expressed Messenger and a Wandering Samurai", a samurai period drama modeled after Steven Spielberg`s...
  
  
• Ishii Katsuhito
  Katsuhito Ishii
  -Work:Katsuhito Ishii began directing commercials in 1992, receiving numerous awards in this field. His first short film The Promise of August, shot in 1995, went on to receive the Japanese Film Grand Prix in the Fantastic Video Section of the 1995 Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival Ishii...
  
  
• Ishii Sogo
  Sogo Ishii
  ', formerly is a Japanese filmmaker known for his striking visuals and sometimes outlandish subject matter.Ishii was born in Fukuoka City, Fukuoka Prefecture, and is a graduate of Fukuoka Prefectural Fukuoka High School and Nihon University College of Art....
  
  
• Ishii Teruo
  Teruo Ishii
  was a Japanese film director best known in the West for his early films in the Super Giant series, and for his films in the Ero guro subgenre of pinku eiga such as Shogun's Joys of Torture . He also directed the 1965 film, Abashiri Prison, which helped to make Ken Takakura a major star in Japan...
  
  
• Itami Jūzō
  Juzo Itami
  , born , was an actor and a popular modern Japanese film director. Many critics came to regard him as Japan's greatest director since Akira Kurosawa. His 10 movies, all of which he wrote himself, are comic satires on elements of Japanese culture....
  
  
• Itō Daisuke
  Daisuke Itō (film director)
  was a Japanese film director and screenwriter who played a central role in the development of the modern jidaigeki and samurai cinema.-Career:Born in Ehime Prefecture, Itō joined the actors school at Shōchiku in 1920, but soon began writing screenplays under the recommendation of Kaoru Osanai. He...
  
  
• Itō Shunya
  Shunya Ito
  is a Japanese film director famed for starting the Sasori series of 1970s exploitation films based on Toru Shinohara's manga and starring Meiko Kaji. Itō worked for Toei Company for most of his career...
  
  
• Iwai Shunji
  Shunji Iwai
  is a Japanese film director/video artist, writer and documentarian.-Life and career:Iwai was born in Sendai, Japan, Miyagi prefecture. He attended Yokohama National University, graduating in 1987....
  
  

K

• Shusuke Kaneko
  Shusuke Kaneko
  is a Japanese filmmaker and screenwriter.-Career:Shūsuke Kaneko began his career in film with Nikkatsu's Roman Porno film series, in which he served as assistant director to Kōyū Ohara. The series also gave Kaneko his directorial debut with writer Kōichirō Uno's, Kōichirō Uno's Wet and Swinging ,...
  
  
• Kaeriyama Norimasa
  Norimasa Kaeriyama
  was a pioneering Japanese film director and film theorist.-Biography:Beginning with articles he submitted to Yoshizawa Shōten's magazine Katsudō shashinkai while still a student, Kaeriyama developed a long series of critiques of contemporary Japanese cinema that would make him the leading spokesman...
  
  
• Kasugi Nozumi
  Kasugi Nozumi
  is a Japanese film director.-Filmography:*きみのジャージはどこ *スワンズソング　 - External links :*...
  
  
• Katō Yoshikazu
  Yoshikazu Katō
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter.-Life and career:Yoshikazu Katō was born in Kyoto in 1972, and became a fan of the pink film while still in junior high school. He graduated from the Nikkatsu Visual Arts Academy in 1993, and began working in the film industry in 1995...
  
  
• Kawase Naomi
• Kinugasa Teinosuke
  Teinosuke Kinugasa
  -External links:* *...
  
  
• Kitamura Ryuhei
• Kitano Takeshi
• Kobayashi Masaki
• Kobayashi Satoru
  Satoru Kobayashi (director)
  was a Japanese film director most famous for directing the first pink film, the type of softcore pornographic films that became the most prolific film genre in Japan during the 1960s and 1970s...
  
  
• Koizumi Takashi
• Kon Satoshi
• Konuma Masaru
  Masaru Konuma
  is a Japanese director most famous for his Roman Porno films for Nikkatsu during the 1970s.-Early life:Masaru Konuma was born in Otaru, Hokkaidō, on December 30, 1937. Konuma retains no memories of his father who was a teacher...
  
  
• Koreeda Hirokazu
• Kōyama Seijirō
  Seijirō Kōyama
  is a Japanese film director.-Career:Born in Gifu Prefecture, Kōyama attended Nihon University but quit midway to join the independent production company Kindai Eiga Kyōkai, where he worked as an assistant director under such directors as Kaneto Shindō, Kōzaburō Yoshimura, and Tadashi Imai...
  
  
• Kumashiro Tatsumi
• Kunizawa Minoru
  Minoru Kunizawa
  aka is a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor best known for his work in the pink film genre. Including Yutaka Ikejima, Yumi Yoshiyuki and Tarō Araki, Kunizawa is one of the four top directors of Ōkura Productions at the turn of the millennium, and the only one of the four who did not...
  
  
• Kuroki Kazuo
  Kazuo Kuroki
  -Filmography:* Silence Has No Wings * Preparation for the Festival * Yūgure made * The Bridge of Tears * Tomorrow * Pickpocket * The Face of Jizo * The Blossoming of Kamiya Etsuko...
  
  
• Kurosawa Akira
  Akira Kurosawa
  was a Japanese film director, producer, screenwriter and editor. Regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema, Kurosawa directed 30 filmsIn 1946, Kurosawa co-directed, with Hideo Sekigawa and Kajiro Yamamoto, the feature Those Who Make Tomorrow ;...
  
  
• Kurosawa Kiyoshi
  Kiyoshi Kurosawa
  is a Japanese filmmaker. He is best known for his many contributions to the Japanese horror genre.-Biography:Born in Kobe on July 19, 1955, Kiyoshi Kurosawa is not related to director Akira Kurosawa...
  
  

M

• Masumura Yasuzo
  Yasuzo Masumura
  was a Japanese film director.Masumura was born in Kōfu on Honshū. After dropping out of a law course at the University of Tokyo he worked as an assistant director at the Daiei studio, later returning to university to study philosophy; he graduated in 1949...
  
  
• Meike Mitsuru
  Mitsuru Meike
  is a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor. He is one of the group of prominent pink film directors known collectively as the .-Life and career:...
  
  
• Mihara Mitsuhiro
  Mitsuhiro Mihara
  -Filmography:*真夏のビタミン *風の王国 *燃えよピンポン *絵里に首ったけ...
  
  
• Miike Takashi
  Takashi Miike
  is a highly prolific and controversial Japanese filmmaker. He has directed over seventy theatrical, video, and television productions since his debut in 1991. In the years 2001 and 2002 alone, Miike is credited with directing fifteen productions...
  
  
• Mitani Koki
  Koki Mitani
  is a Japanese playwright, screenwriter, actor and film director. He was previously married to Japanese actress Satomi Kobayashi. The name "Koki" is a combination of two Japanese characters - 幸 "Happy" and 喜 "Pleased". In an attempt to add his own character to his movies, as a director he takes...
  
  
• Miyazaki Hayao
  Hayao Miyazaki
  is a Japanese manga artist and prominent film director and animator of many popular anime feature films. Through a career that has spanned nearly fifty years, Miyazaki has attained international acclaim as a maker of animated feature films and, along with Isao Takahata, co-founded Studio Ghibli,...
  
  
• Mizoguchi Kenji
  Kenji Mizoguchi
  Kenji Mizoguchi was a Japanese film director and screenwriter. His film Ugetsu won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival, and appeared in the Sight & Sound Critics' Top Ten Poll in 1962 and 1972. Mizoguchi is renowned for his mastery of the long take and mise-en-scène...
  
  
• Mukai Kan
  Kan Mukai
  aka Hiroshi Mukai and was a Japanese film director, cinematographer, producer and screenwriter, known for his pioneering work in the pink film genre...
  
  
• Murakami Ryū
  Ryu Murakami
  is a Japanese novelist and filmmaker. He is colloquially referred to as the "Maradona of Japanese literature".-Biography:Born as Ryūnosuke Murakami in Sasebo, Nagasaki on February 19, 1952...
  
  
• Murata Minoru
  Minoru Murata
  was a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor who was one of the major directors of the silent era in Japan.-Career:Born in Tokyo, Murata started out as a shingeki actor on the stage. Murata's troupe appeared in the first "pure films" directed by Norimasa Kaeriyama at Tenkatsu in 1918...
  
  

N

• Nagasawa Masahiko
• Nakajima Sadao
  Sadao Nakajima
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter known for his work in yakuza film and jidaigeki.-Career:Born in Chiba Prefecture, he attended Hibiya High School and then the University of Tokyo before joining the Tōei studio in 1959...
  
  
• Nakano Hiroyuki
• Nakata Hideo
  Hideo Nakata
  Hideo Nakata is a Japanese filmmaker.-Life and career:Nakata was born in Okayama, Japan. He is most familiar to Western audiences for his work on Japanese horror films such as Ring , Ring 2 and Dark Water...
  
  
• Naruse Mikio
  Mikio Naruse
  was a Japanese filmmaker, screenwriter, and producer who directed some 89 films spanning the period 1930 to 1967.Naruse is known for imbuing his films with a bleak and pessimistic outlook...
  
  
• Nishihara Giichi
• Nishikawa Katsumi
  Katsumi Nishikawa
  was a Japanese film director most famous for his youth films . Graduating from Nihon University, he started out at the Shochiku studio in 1939 and directed his first film in 1952...
  
  
• Nishikawa Miwa
• Emiko Nozomi
• Nomura Yoshitaro

O

• Ohara‎ Kōyū
  Koyu Ohara
  is a Japanese film director best known known for his popular Roman Porno films, Fairy in a Cage and the Pink Tush Girl series...
  
  
• Okamoto Kihachi
• Oshii Mamoru
  Mamoru Oshii
  Mamoru Oshii is a Japanese filmmaker, television director, and writer. Famous for his philosophy-oriented storytelling, Oshii has directed a number of popular anime, including Urusei Yatsura 2: Beautiful Dreamer, Ghost in the Shell, and Patlabor 2...
  
  
• Ōshima Nagisa
  Nagisa Oshima
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter. After graduating from Kyoto University he was hired by Shochiku Ltd. and quickly progressed to directing his own movies, making his debut feature A Town of Love and Hope in 1959....
  
  
• Otomo Katsuhiro
• Ozu Yasujiro
  Yasujiro Ozu
  was a prominent Japanese film director and script writer. He is known for his distinctive technical style, developed during the silent era. Marriage and family, especially the relationships between the generations, are among the most persistent themes in his body of work...
  
  

S

• Sabu
  Sabu (director)
  is the pseudonym of Japanese actor and director .-Career:Born in Wakayama Prefecture, Sabu studied at an Osaka fashion school before deciding to go to Tokyo to become a professional musician. It was suggested he try acting and in 1986 he made his film debut in Sorobanzuku...
  
   (1964- )
• Sai Yoichi (Choi Yang-il) (1949- )
• Saitō Kōichi
  Kōichi Saitō (film director)
  was a Japanese film director and photographer.-Career:Born in Tokyo, Saitō started studying at Rikkyo University but ended up graduating from the Tokyo College of Photography...
  
  
• Saito Torajiro
  Torajiro Saito
  was a Japanese film director known for his comedy films. Born in Akita Prefecture, he entered Shōchiku's Kamata studio in 1922 and debuted as a director in 1926. He later worked at the Shintōhō and Tōhō studios...
  
   (1905-1982)
• Sakamoto Junji (1957- )
• Sano‎ Kazuhiro
• Sasaki Hirohisa
  Hirohisa Sasaki
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter.-Filmography:*Totoshi: Taagetto 1: Seifuku o Nuida Bijin Hisho *Crazy Lips *Gore from Outer Space *Chi o Sū Uchū: Gaiden: Henshin...
  
  
• Sato Hajime
• Sato Junya
• Sato‎ Toshiki
  Toshiki Sato
  aka , , and is a Japanese film director and screenwriter best known for his pink films of the 1990s. Along with fellow directors, Takahisa Zeze, Kazuhiro Sano and Hisayasu Satō, he is known as one of the .-Life and career:...
  
  
• Seki Kōji
  Kōji Seki
  aka is a Japanese film director known for his pioneering work in the pink film genre. Among the accomplishments of Seki's career: he directed the first pink films for Kokuei, the oldest pink film company, Japan's first 3-D film, the world's first 3-D sex film, and Japan's first "invisible man"...
  
  
• Sekine Kazuyoshi
• Shiota Akihiko
  Akihiko Shiota
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter.-Career:Born in Kyoto Prefecture, Shiota attended Rikkyō University, where he began making 8mm films in the tradition of other Rikkyō students like Kiyoshi Kurosawa...
  
   (1961-)
• Shiina Makoto
• Shimazu Yasujirō
  Yasujirō Shimazu
  was a Japanese film director and screenwriter, who was one of the major creators of the shōshimingeki genre at the Shōchiku studios in pre-World War II Japan....
  
  
• Shimizu Hiroshi
  Hiroshi Shimizu (director)
  was a Japanese film director, known for his silent films with detailed depictions of Japanese society.-Career:Shimizu was born in Shizuoka and attended Hokkaidō University but left before graduating. He joined the Shochiku studio in Tokyo in 1921 and made his directorial debut in 1924, at the age...
  
  
• Shimizu Takashi
• Shindo Kaneto
• Shinoda Masahiro
• Shinohara Tetsuo
• Sone Chusei
  Chusei Sone
  is a Japanese film director known primarily for his stylish and popular Roman Porno films for Nikkatsu, particularly the first two installments of the Angel Guts series. Despite a somewhat uneven career, many mainstream critics consider Sone the best of Nikkatsu's Roman Porno directors.-Life and...
  
  
• Suo Masayuki
  Masayuki Suo
  is a Japanese film director. He is perhaps best known for his two Japan Academy Prize-winning films, 1992's Sumo Do, Sumo Don't and 1996's Shall We Dance?.According to Suo:- Life and career :...
  
  
• Suzuki Seijun

T

• Tajiri Yūji
  Yūji Tajiri
  is a Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor. He is one of the group of pink film directors collectively known as the .-Life and career:...
  
  
• Takabori Yoshiya
• Takamine Gō
  Gō Takamine
  is a Japanese director of fiction films, documentaries and experimental films. Born on Ishigaki Island and raised in Naha, Takamine went to university in Kyoto and there began making 8mm films...
  
  
• Takechi‎ Tetsuji
• Takehora Tetsuya
  Tetsuya Takehora
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter.-Life and career:Tetsuya Takehora studied at the , founded by director Shōhei Imamura in 1975 as the Yokohama Vocational School of Broadcast and Film. He entered the film industry as an assistant director at Ōkura Pictures , in which capacity he worked...
  
  
• Takita Yōjirō
  Yojiro Takita
  Yōjirō Takita , is a Japanese filmmaker.-Career:Yōjirō Takita entered the film industry throughMukai Productions, where he served as an assistant director...
  
  
• Tanaka Eizō
  Eizō Tanaka
  was a early Japanese film director, screenwriter, and actor.-Life and career:Tanaka initially trained as a stage actor in the shingeki movement under Kaoru Osanai, but eventually joined the Nikkatsu film studio in 1917...
  
  
• Tanaka Noboru
  Noboru Tanaka
  was a Japanese film director best known known for his Roman Porno films, including three critically respected films known as the Showa trilogy: A Woman Called Sada Abe , Watcher in the Attic , and Beauty's Exotic Dance: Torture! , all three starring Nikkatsu Roman porno queen Junko Miyashita...
  
  
• Tasaka Tomotaka
  Tomotaka Tasaka
  was a Japanese film director.-Career:Born in Hiroshima Prefecture, he began working at Nikkatsu's Kyoto studio in 1924 and eventually came to prominence for a series of realist, humanist films made at Nikkatsu's Tamagawa studio in the late 1930s such as Robō no ishi and Mud and Soldiers, both of...
  
  
• Teshigahara Hiroshi
• Tezuka Osamu
  Osamu Tezuka
  was a Japanese cartoonist, manga artist, animator, producer, activist and medical doctor, although he never practiced medicine. Born in Osaka Prefecture, he is best known as the creator of Astro Boy, Kimba the White Lion and Black Jack...
  
  
• Tsuburaya Eiji
  Eiji Tsuburaya
  was the Japanese special effects director responsible for many Japanese science-fiction movies, including the Godzilla series...
  
  
• Tsukamoto Shinya
  Shinya Tsukamoto
  is a Japanese film director and actor with a considerable cult following both domestically and abroad.-Biography:Tsukamoto started making movies at the age of 14, when his father gave him a Super 8 camera. He made a number of films, ranging...
  
  

Y

• Yagi Takeshi
  Takeshi Yagi
  is a Japanese TV director/producer whose credits include Tsuburaya Productions' popular Ultra Series.-Personal history:Born in 1967, Yagi grew up during the boom of tokusatsu television shows in Japan. In the mid-1990s, he joined Tsuburaya Productions, the creators of the popular Ultra Series,...
  
  
• Yamada Yōji
• Yamaguchi Kazuhiko
  Kazuhiko Yamaguchi
  is a Japanese film director.-Career:Born in Nagano Prefecture, Yamaguchi graduated from Waseda University and began working at the Tōei studios in Kyoto...
  
  
• Yamamoto Masashi
  Masashi Yamamoto
  is a Japanese film director.-Career:Born in Ōita Prefecture, Yamamoto attended Meiji University but left early to concentrate on making independent 8mm films. His Carnival in the Night screened at the 1983 Berlin Film Festival and Robinson's Garden was given the Zitty Award at 1987 edition of the...
  
  
• Yamamoto Satsuo
  Satsuo Yamamoto
  was a Japanese film director.Yamamoto was born in Kagoshima Prefecture on July 15, 1910. He dropped out of Waseda University to join Shochiku, where he worked as an assistant director to Mikio Naruse and others. He followed Naruse when he moved to PCL, and became a director in his own right after...
  
  
• Yanagimachi Mitsuo
  Mitsuo Yanagimachi
  Mitsuo Yanagimachi is an award-winning Japanese screenwriter and film director.-Career:...
  
  
• Yoshida Keisuke
  Keisuke Yoshida
  is a Japanese film director and screenwriter. His film Raw Summer won the Fantastic Off-Theatre Competition Grand Prize at the 2006 Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival.-Filmography:*Raw Summer *Tsukue no Nakami...
  
  
• Yukisada Isao
  Isao Yukisada
  from Kumamoto, Japan is a Japanese film director. He served as assistant director on Shunji Iwai's Love Letter, April Story, and Swallowtail Butterfly.-Director:* OPEN HOUSE * A Closing Day...
  
  
• Yoshiyuki Yumi
  Yumi Yoshiyuki
  is a Japanese film director, actress, and screenwriter best known for her work in the pink film genre.-Life and career:While studying economics at Dokkyo University, Yoshiyuki developed a love of film. She debuted as an actress in the pink film genre in 1993 in director Toshiki Satō's...
  
  

External links

• Japanese Documentary Retrospective at the Punto de Vista Documentary Film Festival of Navarra, Spain
• JapaneseDirectors.com Top director profiles and guide to English subtitled DVD releases