The Imperial Japanese Army ( IJA ) was the principal ground force of the Empire of Japan . Forming one of the military branches of the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces (IJAF), it was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Army Ministry , both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor of Japan , the supreme commander of IJAF. During the 20th century, an Inspectorate General of Aviation became the third agency with oversight of the IJA. At its height, the IJA was one of the most influential factions in the politics of Japan .
184-503: Toshiro Mifune ( 三船 敏郎 , Mifune Toshirō , April 1, 1920 – December 24, 1997) was a Japanese actor and producer. The recipient of numerous awards and accolades over a lengthy career, he is widely considered one of the greatest actors of all time. A leading figure in the Japanese film industry , he often played hypermasculine characters and was noted for his commanding screen presence. Although he amassed more than 180 screen credits, Mifune
368-550: A Corpse). The first documentary, the short Geisha no teodori (芸者の手踊り), was made in June 1899. Tsunekichi Shibata made a number of early films, including Momijigari , an 1899 record of two famous actors performing a scene from a well-known kabuki play. Early films were influenced by traditional theater – for example, kabuki and bunraku . At the dawn of the 20th century, theaters in Japan hired benshi , storytellers who sat next to
552-528: A Qing territory. It marked the first overseas deployment of the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy. An Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors of 1882 called for unquestioning loyalty to the Emperor by the new armed forces and asserted that commands from superior officers were equivalent to commands from the Emperor himself. Thenceforth, the military existed in an intimate and privileged relationship with
736-549: A band of hired samurai who protect a helpless village from a rapacious gang of thieves. The same year, Kurosawa's friend and colleague Ishirō Honda directed the anti-nuclear monster-drama Godzilla , featuring award-winning effects by Eiji Tsuburaya. The latter film was first ever Japanese film to be given a wide release throughout the United States, where it was heavily re-edited, and featured new footage with actor Raymond Burr for its distribution in 1956 as Godzilla, King of
920-521: A blade, he somehow summoned the tone of epics. There's a tendency to make Mifune sound mythical. The leading man of Kurosawa- gumi , the Emperor's coterie, he would cement his superstar status in over 150 films in his lifetime, acting for other famed directors — Hiroshi Inagaki , Kajiro Yamamoto , Kihachi Okamoto — in roles ranging from a caped lover to a Mexican bandit. Mifune's life on-screen centers solely around men. Women, when they do appear, feel arbitrary, mythical, temporary: it's clear that no one
1104-511: A counterbalance to the Chinese troops camped at Asan. Simultaneously, the Japanese decided to send a reinforced brigade of approximately 8,000 troops to Korea. The reinforced brigade, included auxiliary units, under the command of General Oshima Yoshimasa was fully transported to Korea by June 27. The Japanese stated to the Chinese that they were willing to withdraw the brigade under General Oshima if
1288-612: A decisive blow to the Russian armies. Over-reliance on infantry led to large casualties among Japanese forces, especially during the siege of Port Arthur . The Empire of Japan entered the war on the Entente side . Although tentative plans were made to send an expeditionary force of between 100,000 and 500,000 men to fight in France on the Western Front , ultimately among the few actions in which
1472-466: A documentary chronicling Mifune's life and career. Due to variations in translation from the Japanese and other factors, there are multiple titles to many of Mifune's films (see IMDb link). The titles shown here are the most common ones used in the United States, with the original Japanese title listed below it in parentheses. Mifune's filmography mainly consists of Japanese productions, unless noted otherwise (see Notes column). The 1999 Danish film Mifune
1656-513: A factor in the government's abolition of the han system . The military ministry ( Hyōbushō ) was reorganized in July 1871; on August 29, simultaneously with the decree abolishing the domains, the Dajōkan ordered local daimyos to disband their private armies and turn their weapons over to the government. Although the government played on the foreign threat, especially Russia's southward expansion, to justify
1840-478: 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. Among intellectuals, critiques of Japanese cinema grew in the 1910s and eventually developed into a movement that transformed Japanese film. Film criticism began with early film magazines such as Katsudō shashinkai (begun in 1909) and
2024-532: A former kabuki actor, to star in his productions. Onoe became Japan's first film star , appearing in over 1,000 films, mostly shorts, between 1909 and 1926. The pair pioneered the jidaigeki genre. Tokihiko Okada was a popular romantic lead of the same era. The first Japanese film production studio was built in 1909 by the Yoshizawa Shōten company in Tokyo . The first female Japanese performer to appear in
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#17328758952812208-408: A full-length book written by Yasunosuke Gonda in 1914, but many early film critics often focused on chastising the work of studios like Nikkatsu and Tenkatsu for being too theatrical (using, for instance, elements from kabuki and shinpa such as onnagata ) and for not utilizing what were considered more cinematic techniques to tell stories, instead relying on benshi. In what was later named
2392-570: A higher degree of return for their low pay than they otherwise would have received. However, at the end of the war, the Imperial Japanese ministry of finance cancelled all military bank notes, rendering the military yen worthless. Throughout the Second Sino-Japanese War and World War II, the Imperial Japanese Army had shown immense brutality and engaged in numerous atrocities against civilians , as well as prisoners of war – with
2576-412: A history that spans more than 100 years. Japan has one of the oldest and largest film industries in the world; as of 2021, it was the fourth largest by number of feature films produced. In 2011, Japan produced 411 feature films that earned 54.9% of a box office total of US$ 2.338 billion. Films have been produced in Japan since 1897. During the 1950s, a period dubbed the "Golden Age of Japanese cinema",
2760-509: A major highway. Overseeing these four armies was a new high command, the Eastern Expeditionary High Command ( Tōsei daisō tokufu ), whose nominal head was prince Arisugawa-no-miya , with two court nobles as senior staff officers. This connected the loose assembly of domain forces with the imperial court , which was the only national institution in a still unformed nation-state. The army continually emphasized its link with
2944-576: A means of resolving disputes. This was enacted by the Japanese in order to prevent militarism , which had led to conflict. However, in 1947 the Public Security Force was formed; later in 1954, in the early stages of the Cold War , the Public Security Force formed the basis of the newly created Ground Self-Defense Force. Although significantly smaller than the former Imperial Japanese Army and nominally for defensive purposes only, this force constitutes
3128-522: A national army, the immediately perceived danger was domestic insurrection. Consequently, on August 31, the country was divided into four military districts, each with its own chindai ( garrison ) to deal with peasant uprisings or samurai insurrections. The Imperial Guard formed the Tokyo garrison, whereas troops from the former domains filled the ranks of the Osaka, Kumamoto, and Sendai garrisons. The four garrisons had
3312-469: A natural beard — one he had to keep for the entirety of the film's two years of shooting — he was unable to act in any other films during the production. This put Mifune and his financially strapped production company deeply into debt, creating friction between him and Kurosawa. Although Red Beard played to packed houses in Japan and Europe, which helped Mifune recoup some of his losses, the ensuing years held varying outcomes for both Mifune and Kurosawa. After
3496-466: A precursor to the neorealism genre, was a silent film. A few Japanese sound shorts were made in the 1920s and 1930s, but Japan's first feature-length talkie was Fujiwara Yoshie no furusato (1930), which used the Mina Talkie System . Notable talkies of this period include Mikio Naruse 's Wife, Be Like A Rose! ( Tsuma Yo Bara No Yoni , 1935), which was one of the first Japanese films to gain
3680-399: A production company to produce the experimental masterpiece A Page of Madness , starring Masao Inoue, in 1926. Many of these companies, while surviving during the silent era against major studios like Nikkatsu , Shochiku , Teikine , and Toa Studios , could not survive the cost involved in converting to sound. With the rise of left-wing political movements and labor unions at the end of
3864-474: A series of cliches. I, for one, have no desire to retell Madame Butterfly ." "An actor is not a puppet with strings pulled by the director. He is a human being with seeds of all emotions, desires, and needs within himself. I attempt to find the very center of this humanity and explore and experiment." Of Toshiro Mifune, in his 1991 book Cult Movie Stars , Danny Peary wrote, Vastly talented, charismatic, and imposing (because of his strong voice and physique),
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#17328758952814048-638: A shortage of supplies, especially food, medicine, munitions, and armaments, largely due to submarine interdiction of supplies, and losses to Japanese shipping, which was worsened by a longstanding rivalry with the Imperial Japanese Navy . The lack of supplies caused large numbers of fighter aircraft to become unserviceable for lack of spare parts, and "as many as two-thirds of Japan's total military deaths [to result] from illness or starvation". Compared to respective armies in Europe or America , soldiers in
4232-571: A star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his work in the motion picture industry. Of Akira Kurosawa, Toshiro Mifune said, "I have never as an actor done anything that I am proud of other than with him". Mifune had a kind of talent I had never encountered before in the Japanese film world. It was, above all, the speed with which he expressed himself that was astounding. The ordinary Japanese actor might need ten feet of film to get across an impression; Mifune needed only three. The speed of his movements
4416-505: A star symbolizing the beginning of a new era. In Yasushi Sasaki 's Hatachi no Seishun (1946), the first kiss scene of a Japanese movie was filmed. The Mainichi Film Award was also created in 1946. The first movie released after the war was Soyokaze , directed by Yasushi Sasaki , and the theme song Ringo no Uta was a big hit. The first collaborations between Akira Kurosawa and actor Toshiro Mifune were Drunken Angel in 1948 and Stray Dog in 1949. Yasujirō Ozu directed
4600-653: A theatrical release in the U.S.; Kenji Mizoguchi 's Sisters of the Gion ( Gion no shimai , 1936); Osaka Elegy (1936); The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums (1939); and Sadao Yamanaka 's Humanity and Paper Balloons (1937). Film criticism shared this vitality, with many film journals such as Kinema Junpo and newspapers printing detailed discussions of the cinema of the day, both at home and abroad. A cultured "impressionist" criticism pursued by critics such as Tadashi Iijima , Fuyuhiko Kitagawa , and Matsuo Kishi
4784-633: A time ( Bruce Lee must have been watching!). It is a testament to his skills as an actor that watching the incredible swordplay does not thrill us any more than watching his face during the battle or just the way he moves, without a trace of panic, across the screen – for no one walks or races with more authority, arrogance, or grace than Mifune's barefoot warriors. For a 20-year period, there was no greater actor – dynamic or action – than Toshiro Mifune. Just look at his credits. In an article published in 2020 by The Criterion Collection in commemoration of Mifune's centenary of birth, Moeko Fujii wrote, For most of
4968-538: A total of about 8,000 troops – mostly infantry, but also a few hundred artillerymen and engineers. Smaller detachments of troops also guarded outposts at Kagoshima, Fushimi, Nagoya, Hiroshima, and elsewhere. By late December 1871, the army set modernization and coastal defense as priorities; long-term plans were devised for an armed force to maintain internal security, defend strategic coastal areas, train and educate military and naval officers, and build arsenals and supply depots. Despite previous rhetoric about
5152-778: A very high reputation. Japanese films gained popularity in the mid-1920s against foreign films, in part fueled by the popularity of movie stars and a new style of jidaigeki . Directors such as Daisuke Itō and Masahiro Makino made samurai films like A Diary of Chuji's Travels and Roningai featuring rebellious antiheroes in fast-cut fight scenes that were both critically acclaimed and commercial successes. Some stars, such as Tsumasaburo Bando , Kanjūrō Arashi , Chiezō Kataoka , Takako Irie and Utaemon Ichikawa , were inspired by Makino Film Productions and formed their own independent production companies where directors such as Hiroshi Inagaki , Mansaku Itami and Sadao Yamanaka honed their skills. Director Teinosuke Kinugasa created
5336-409: A violent frenzy ... it was as frightening as watching a wounded beast trying to break loose. I was transfixed." When Mifune, exhausted, finished his scene, he sat down and gave the judges an ominous stare. He lost the competition but Kurosawa was impressed. "I am a person rarely impressed by actors," he later said. "But in the case of Mifune I was completely overwhelmed." Mifune immersed himself into
5520-581: A wrecked merchant vessel from the Ryukyu Kingdom on the southwestern tip of Taiwan. 12 men were rescued by the local Chinese-speaking community and were transferred to Miyako-jima in the Ryukyu Islands. The Empire of Japan used this as an excuse to both assert sovereignty over the Ryukyu Kingdom, which was a tributary state of both Japan and Qing China at the time, and to attempt the same with Taiwan,
5704-603: Is best known for his 16 collaborations with director Akira Kurosawa . These collaborations included Kurosawa's critically acclaimed jidaigeki films such as Rashomon (1950), for which Mifune won the San Marco Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival , Seven Samurai (1954), Throne of Blood (1957), The Hidden Fortress (1958), and Yojimbo (1961), for which Mifune won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor at
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5888-685: Is named after the actor. All programs originally aired in Japan except for Shōgun which aired in the U.S. on NBC in September 1980 before being subsequently broadcast in Japan on TV Asahi from March 30 to April 6, 1981. Mifune won and was nominated for many awards during his acting career, including six Blue Ribbon Awards , three Mainichi Film Awards , three Japan Academy Film Prize nominations (winning two), and two Kinema Junpo Awards . English Japanese Cinema of Japan The cinema of Japan ( 日本映画 , Nihon eiga ) , also known domestically as hōga ( 邦画 , "domestic cinema") , has
6072-516: Is really invested in the thrums of heterosexual desire... Toshiro Mifune cemented his reputation as an icon of masculinity right alongside Hollywood narratives of neutered Asian manhood. In 1961, Mifune provoked worldwide longing by swaggering around in Yojimbo , the same year that Mickey Rooney played the bucktoothed Mr. Yunioshi in Breakfast at Tiffany's . Looks-wise, he's the opposite of his predecessor,
6256-800: The Hokushin-ron doctrine, and the Japanese establishment of a puppet state in Manchuria brought the two countries into conflict. The war lasted on and off with the last battles of the 1930s (the Battle of Lake Khasan and the Battles of Khalkhin Gol ) ending in a decisive victory for the Soviets. The conflicts stopped with the signing of the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact on April 13, 1941. However, later, at
6440-456: The jidaigeki films of Akira Kurosawa as well as the science fiction films of Ishirō Honda and Eiji Tsuburaya gained Japanese cinema international praise and made these directors universally renown and highly influential. Some of the Japanese films of this period are now rated some of the greatest of all time : Tokyo Story (1953) ranked number three in Sight & Sound critics' list of
6624-512: The Bolshevik Revolution , the Imperial Japanese Army initially planned to send more than 70,000 troops to occupy Siberia as far west as Lake Baikal . The army general staff came to view the Tsarist collapse as an opportunity to free Japan from any future threat from Russia by detaching Siberia and forming an independent buffer state. The plan was scaled back considerably due to opposition from
6808-533: The Boshin War in 1868. The domains of Satsuma and Chōshū came to dominate the coalition against the shogunate. On 27 January 1868, tensions between the shogunate and imperial sides came to a head when Tokugawa Yoshinobu marched on Kyoto , accompanied by a 15,000-strong force, some of which had been trained by French military advisers. They were opposed by 5,000 troops from the Satsuma, Chōshū, and Tosa domains. At
6992-921: The Dagu forts near Tianjin. Four days later, the Qing court declared war on the foreign powers. The British, in light of the precarious situation, were compelled to ask Japan for additional reinforcements, as the Japanese had the only readily available forces in the region. Britain at the time was heavily engaged in the Boer War , and, consequently, a large part of the British army was tied down in South Africa. Deploying large numbers of troops from British garrisons in India would take too much time and weaken internal security there. Overriding personal doubts, Foreign Minister Aoki Shūzō calculated that
7176-526: The French military mission to Japan (1918–19) , headed by Commandant Jacques-Paul Faure , was requested to assist in the development of the Japanese air services. The Japanese invasion of Taiwan under Qing rule in 1874 was a punitive expedition by Japanese military forces in response to the Mudan Incident of December 1871. The Paiwan people , who are indigenous peoples of Taiwan, murdered 54 crewmembers of
7360-724: The German General Staff , was established directly under the Emperor and was given broad powers for military planning and strategy. Other known foreign military consultants were Major Pompeo Grillo from the Kingdom of Italy , who worked at the Osaka foundry from 1884 to 1888, followed by Major Quaratezi from 1889 to 1890; and Captain Schermbeck from the Netherlands, who worked on improving coastal defenses from 1883 to 1886. Japan did not use foreign military advisors between 1890 and 1918, until
7544-701: The Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for Rickshaw Man . Kon Ichikawa directed two anti-war dramas: The Burmese Harp (1956), which was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards, and Fires on the Plain (1959), along with Enjo (1958), which was adapted from Yukio Mishima 's novel Temple of The Golden Pavilion . Masaki Kobayashi made three films which would collectively become known as The Human Condition Trilogy : No Greater Love (1959), and The Road to Eternity (1959). The trilogy
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7728-615: The Hochi Film Award was created. The first winner for Best Film was The Inugamis by Kon Ichikawa . Nagisa Oshima directed In the Realm of the Senses (1976), a film detailing a crime of passion involving Sada Abe set in the 1930s. Controversial for its explicit sexual content, it has never been seen uncensored in Japan. Kinji Fukasaku completed the epic Battles Without Honor and Humanity series of yakuza films. Yoji Yamada introduced
7912-550: The Japanese Communist Party . Independent social realist dramas saw a small and temporary boom amid the wave of sentimental war dramas produced after the end of Occupation. The 1950s are widely considered the Golden Age of Japanese cinema. Three Japanese films from this decade ( Rashomon , Seven Samurai and Tokyo Story ) appeared in the top ten of Sight & Sound ' s critics' and directors' polls for
8096-657: The Japanese government during its occupation before the Republic of China took over the city in 1922. Mifune grew up with his parents and two younger siblings in Dalian , Fengtian from the age of 4 to 19. In his youth, Mifune worked at his father's photo studio. After spending the first 19 years of his life in China , as a Japanese citizen, he was drafted into the Imperial Japanese Army Aviation division, where he served in
8280-738: The Man with No Name , a character similar to Mifune's seemingly-nameless ronin in Yojimbo . Mifune may also be credited with originating the yakuza archetype, with his performance as a mobster in Kurosawa's Drunken Angel (1948), the first yakuza film . Most of the sixteen Kurosawa–Mifune films are considered cinema classics. These include Drunken Angel , Stray Dog , Rashomon , Seven Samurai , The Hidden Fortress , High and Low , Throne of Blood (an adaptation of Shakespeare 's Macbeth ), Yojimbo , and Sanjuro . Mifune and Kurosawa finally parted ways after Red Beard . Several factors contributed to
8464-525: The Moscow -backed Far Eastern Republic . The continued Japanese presence concerned the United States, which suspected that Japan had territorial designs on Siberia and the Russian Far East . Subjected to intense diplomatic pressure by the United States and Great Britain, and facing increasing domestic opposition due to the economic and human cost, the administration of Prime Minister Katō Tomosaburō withdrew
8648-530: The Nanjing Massacre being the most well known example. Other war crimes committed by the Imperial Japanese Army included rape and forced prostitution , death marches , using biological warfare against civilians, and the execution of prisoners of war. Such atrocities throughout the war caused tens of millions of deaths. Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution renounced the right to use force as
8832-463: The Pure Film Movement , writers in magazines such as Kinema Record called for a broader use of such cinematic techniques. Some of these critics, such as Norimasa Kaeriyama , went on to put their ideas into practice by directing such films as The Glow of Life (1918), which was one of the first films to use actresses (in this case, Harumi Hanayagi ). There were parallel efforts elsewhere in
9016-608: The Second Sino-Japanese War , in 1937. As war approached, the Imperial Army's influence with the Emperor waned and the influence of the Imperial Japanese Navy increased. Nevertheless, by 1938 the Army had been expanded to 34 divisions. From 1932 to 1945 the Empire of Japan and the Soviet Union had a series of conflicts . Japan had set its military sights on Soviet territory as a result of
9200-632: The Yalta Conference , Stalin agreed to declare war on Japan; and on August 5, 1945, the Soviet Union voided their neutrality agreement with Japan. In 1941, the Imperial Japanese Army had 51 divisions and various special-purpose artillery, cavalry, anti-aircraft, and armored units with a total of 1,700,000 people. At the beginning of the Second World War , most of the Japanese Army (27 divisions)
9384-694: The best films of all time in 2002. They also appeared in the 2012 polls, with Tokyo Story (1953) dethroning Citizen Kane at the top of the 2012 directors' poll . War movies covering themes previously restricted by SCAP began to be produced, such as Hideo Sekigawa's Listen to the Voices of the Sea (1950), Tadashi Imai 's Himeyuri no Tô ( Tower of the Lilies, 1953), Keisuke Kinoshita 's Twenty-Four Eyes (1954) and Kon Ichikawa 's The Burmese Harp (1956). Works showcasing tragic and sentimental retrospectives of
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#17328758952819568-461: The siege of the diplomatic legations in Beijing . An international force consisting of British , French , Russian , German , Italian , Austro-Hungarian , American , and Japanese troops was eventually assembled to relieve the legations. The Japanese provided the largest contingent of troops, 20,840, as well as 18 warships. A small, hastily assembled, vanguard force of about 2,000 troops, under
9752-725: The 100 greatest films of all time and also topped the 2012 Sight & Sound directors' poll of The Top 50 Greatest Films of All Time , dethroning Citizen Kane , while Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai (1954) was voted the greatest foreign-language film of all time in BBC 's 2018 poll of 209 critics in 43 countries. Japan has also won the Academy Award for the Best International Feature Film five times, more than any other Asian country. Japan's Big Four film studios are Toho , Toei , Shochiku and Kadokawa , which are
9936-453: The 1890s, the Imperial Japanese Army had grown to become the most modern army in Asia: well-trained, well-equipped, and with good morale. However, it was basically an infantry force deficient in cavalry and artillery when compared with its European contemporaries. Artillery pieces, which were purchased from America and a variety of European nations, presented two problems: they were scarce, and
10120-541: The 1920s, there arose so-called tendency films with left-leaning tendencies. Directors Kenji Mizoguchi , Daisuke Itō , Shigeyoshi Suzuki , and Tomu Uchida were prominent examples. In contrast to these commercially produced 35 mm films , the Marxist Proletarian Film League of Japan (Prokino) made works independently in smaller gauges (such as 9.5mm and 16mm ), with more radical intentions. Tendency films suffered from severe censorship heading into
10304-403: The 1930s, and Prokino members were arrested and the movement effectively crushed. Such moves by the government had profound effects on the expression of political dissent in 1930s cinema. Films from this period include: Sakanaya Honda , Jitsuroku Chushingura , Horaijima, Orochi , Maboroshi, Kurutta Ippeji , Jujiro , Kurama Tengu: Kyōfu Jidai , and Kurama Tengu . The 1923 earthquake ,
10488-589: The 1961 classic Yojimbo . Yasujirō Ozu made his final film, An Autumn Afternoon , in 1962. Mikio Naruse directed the wide screen melodrama When a Woman Ascends the Stairs in 1960; his final film was 1967's Scattered Clouds . Kon Ichikawa captured the watershed 1964 Olympics in his three-hour documentary Tokyo Olympiad (1965). Seijun Suzuki was fired by Nikkatsu for "making films that don't make any sense and don't make any money" after his surrealist yakuza flick Branded to Kill (1967). The 1960s were
10672-507: The 1965 film Red Beard , which won him the Best Actor at the Venice Film Festival for a second time, Mifune turned to roles abroad. He starred in films such as Ánimas Trujano (1962), for which he won another Blue Ribbon Award for Best Actor, Grand Prix (1966), which was his Hollywood debut, Hell in the Pacific (1968), Red Sun (1971), Paper Tiger (1975), Midway (1976), and Steven Spielberg 's 1941 (1979). Mifune died of organ failure on December 24, 1997. In 1999, he
10856-458: The 1980 TV miniseries Shogun . However, the series' blunt portrayal of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the greatly abridged version shown in Japan meant that it was not as well received in his homeland. The relationship between Kurosawa and Mifune remained ambivalent. Kurosawa criticized Mifune's acting in Interview magazine and also said that "All the films that I made with Mifune, without him, they would not exist". He also presented Mifune with
11040-426: The Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. The 1980s saw the decline of the major Japanese film studios and their associated chains of cinemas, with major studios Toho and Toei barely staying in business, Shochiku supported almost solely by the Otoko wa tsurai yo films, and Nikkatsu declining even further. Imperial Japanese Army In the mid-19th century, Japan had no unified national army and
11224-407: The Aerial Photography unit during World War II . In 1947, a large number of Toho actors, after a prolonged strike, had left to form their own company, Shin Toho . Toho then organized a "new faces" contest to find new talent. Nenji Oyama, a friend of Mifune's who worked for the Photography Department of Toho Productions , sent Mifune's resume to the New Faces audition as the Photography Department
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#173287589528111408-597: The Chinese left Asan prior. However, when on 16 July, 8,000 Chinese troops landed near the entrance of the Taedong River to reinforce Chinese troops garrisoned in Pyongyang , the Japanese delivered Li Hongzhang an ultimatum, threatening to take action if any further troops were sent to Korea. Consequently, General Oshima in Seoul and commanders of the Japanese warships in Korean waters received orders allowing them to initiate military operations if any more Chinese troops were sent to Korea. Despite this ultimatum, Li, considered that Japanese were bluffing and were trying to probe
11592-441: The Chinese name Li Xianglan so she could represent Chinese roles in Japanese propaganda movies. After the war she used her official Japanese name and starred in an additional 29 movies. She was elected as a member of the Japanese parliament in the 1970s and served for 18 years. Akira Kurosawa made his feature film debut with Sugata Sanshiro in 1943. After the surrender of Japan in 1945, wartime controls and restrictions on
11776-424: The Chinese readiness to make concessions. He decided, therefore to reinforce Chinese forces in Asan with a further 2,500 troops, 1,300 of which arrived in Asan during the night of July 23–24. At the same time, in the early morning of July 23, the Japanese had taken control of the Royal Palace in Seoul and imprisoned King Gojong , forcing him to renounce ties with China. During the almost two-month interval prior to
11960-429: The Donghak Peasant Revolution would lead to Chinese intervention in Korea. As a result, soon after learning word about the Korean government's request for Chinese military help, immediately ordered all warships in the vicinity to be sent to Pusan and Chemulpo . On June 9, a formation of 420 rikusentai , selected from the crews of the Japanese warships was immediately dispatched to Seoul, where they served temporarily as
12144-411: The Golden Bear at the 13th Berlin International Film Festival . Immortal Love by Keisuke Kinoshita and Twin Sisters of Kyoto and Portrait of Chieko , both by Noboru Nakamura , also received nominations for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards. Lost Spring , also by Nakamura, was in competition for the Golden Bear at the 17th Berlin International Film Festival . The 1970s saw
12328-415: The Imperial Japanese Army received a rather meagre salary; however, the cost of living in Japan was also cheaper than in most Western nations. The below table gives figures from December 1941, when one Japanese yen was worth approximately $ 0.23. For comparison, in 1942, an American private was paid approximately $ 50 per month (or 204 yen), meaning the lowest ranking soldier in the United States military
12512-399: The Imperial Japanese Army was involved was the careful and well executed attack on the German concession of Qingdao in 1914 and the seizure of various other small German islands and colonies. During 1917–18, Japan continued to extend its influence and privileges in China via the Nishihara Loans . During the Siberian Intervention , following the collapse of the Russian Empire after
12696-746: The Japanese film industry were abolished, and the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP) established the Civil Information and Education Section (CIE), which came to manage the industry. All film proposals and screenplays were to be processed and approved by CIE. The script would then be processed by the Civil Censorship Detachment (CCD), which was under the direct control of American military. Pre-war and wartime films were also subject to review, and over 500 were condemned, with half of them being burned. In addition, Toho and Daiei pre-emptively destroyed films they thought to be incriminating. In November 1945, CIE announced that it would forbid films deemed to be: A major consequence of these restrictions
12880-451: The Japanese forces in October 1922. In the 1920s the Imperial Japanese Army expanded rapidly and by 1927 had a force of 300,000 men. Unlike western countries, the Army enjoyed a great deal of independence from government. Under the provisions of the Meiji Constitution , the War Minister was held accountable only to the Emperor ( Hirohito ) himself, and not to the elected civilian government. In fact, Japanese civilian administrations needed
13064-399: The Japanese of the action. It was decided to send 2,500 men to Asan , about 70 km from the capital Seoul. The troops arrived in Asan on June 9 and were additionally reinforced by 400 more on June 25, a total of about 2,900 Chinese soldiers were at Asan. From the very outset the developments in Korea had been carefully observed in Tokyo. Japanese government had soon become convinced that
13248-460: The Japanese, constituting slightly less than half of the assault force, accounted for almost two-thirds of the losses, 280 of 453. The Russo–Japanese War (1904–1905) was the result of tensions between Russia and Japan , grown largely out of rival imperialist ambitions toward Manchuria and Korea . The Japanese army inflicted severe losses against the Russians; however, they were not able to deal
13432-542: The Kawashita award which he himself had won two years prior. They frequently encountered each other professionally and met again in 1993 at the funeral of their friend Ishirō Honda , but never collaborated again. Among Mifune's fellow performers, one of the 32 women chosen during the new faces contest was Sachiko Yoshimine. Eight years Mifune's junior, she came from a respected Tokyo family. They fell in love and Mifune soon proposed marriage. Director Senkichi Taniguchi , with
13616-609: The Monsters! . Although it was edited for its Western release, Godzilla became an international icon of Japan and spawned an entire subgenre of kaiju films, as well as the longest-running film franchise in history . Also in 1954, another Kurosawa film, Ikiru was in competition at the 4th Berlin International Film Festival . In 1955, Hiroshi Inagaki won an Academy Honorary Award for Best Foreign Language Film for Part I of his Samurai trilogy and in 1958 won
13800-552: The Mountain (1954) and Floating Clouds (1955). Yasujirō Ozu began directing color films beginning with Equinox Flower (1958), and later Good Morning (1959) and Floating Weeds (1958), which was adapted from his earlier silent A Story of Floating Weeds (1934), and was shot by Rashomon and Sansho the Bailiff cinematographer Kazuo Miyagawa . The Blue Ribbon Awards were established in 1950. The first winner for Best Film
13984-521: The United Kingdom, by any standards, despite being widely considered a "first rate" or professional fighting force, men serving in the IJA were very poorly compensated. Complicating matters further was that, by 1942, most Japanese soldiers were paid using the Japanese military yen (JMY), an unsupported currency that could not be redeemed for the regular Japanese yen. In territories under Japanese occupation,
14168-696: The United States and its allied coalition partners withdrew from Vladivostok , after the capture and execution of the White Army leader, Admiral Kolchak, by the Red Army. However, the Japanese decided to stay, primarily due to fears of the spread of communism so close to Japan and Japanese-controlled Korea . The Japanese Army provided military support to the Japanese-backed Provisional Priamurye Government , based in Vladivostok, against
14352-644: The United States sent forces to Siberia to bolster the armies of the White movement leader Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak against the Bolshevik Red Army . Once the political decision had been reached, the Imperial Japanese Army took over full control under Chief of Staff General Yui Mitsue ; and by November 1918, more than 70,000 Japanese troops had occupied all ports and major towns in the Russian Maritime Provinces and eastern Siberia. In June 1920,
14536-577: The United States. In July 1918, the U.S. President , Woodrow Wilson , asked the Japanese government to supply 7,000 troops as part of an international coalition of 24,000 troops to support the American Expeditionary Force Siberia . After a heated debate in the Diet , the government of Prime Minister Terauchi Masatake agreed to send 12,000 troops, but under the command of Japan, rather than as part of an international coalition. Japan and
14720-789: The Venice Film Festival and was recognised at the Blue Ribbon Awards as Best Actor. He also portrayed Miyamoto Musashi in Hiroshi Inagaki 's Samurai Trilogy (1954–1956), Lord Toranaga in the NBC television miniseries Shōgun , and Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto in three different films. In 1962, he established Mifune Productions , achieving success with large-scale works including The Sands of Kurobe (1968) and Samurai Banners (1969). He starred in his directorial debut film Goju Man-nin no Isan (1963). Following his performance in
14904-478: The advantages of participating in an allied coalition were too attractive to ignore. Prime Minister Yamagata likewise concurred, but others in the cabinet demanded that there be guarantees from the British in return for the risks and costs of a major deployment of Japanese troops. On July 6, the 5th Infantry Division was alerted for possible deployment to China, but without a timetable being set. Two days later, on July 8, with more ground troops urgently needed to lift
15088-559: The age of 77. Mifune won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor twice, in 1961 and 1965. He was awarded the Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon in 1986 and the Order of the Sacred Treasure in 1993. In 1973, he was a member of the jury at the 8th Moscow International Film Festival . In 1977, he was a member of the jury at the 10th Moscow International Film Festival . On November 14, 2016, Mifune received
15272-444: The armed forces. In 1931, the Imperial Japanese Army had an overall strength of 198,880 officers and men, organized into 17 divisions. The Manchurian incident , as it became known in Japan, was a pretended sabotage of a local Japanese-owned railway, an attack staged by Japan but blamed on Chinese dissidents. Action by the military, largely independent of the civilian leadership, led to the invasion of Manchuria in 1931 and, later, to
15456-415: The army and one for the navy. The directorate drafted an army from troop contributions from each domain proportional to each domain's annual rice production ( koku ) . This conscript army ( chōheigun ) integrated samurai and commoners from various domains into its ranks. As the war continued, the military affairs directorate expected to raise troops from the wealthier domains and, in June, the organization of
15640-475: The army numbered approximately 17,900 from a population of 35 million at the time; it doubled to about 33,000 in 1875. The conscription program slowly built up the numbers. Public unrest began in 1874, reaching the apex in the Satsuma Rebellion of 1877, which used the slogans, "oppose conscription", "oppose elementary schools", and "fight Korea". It took a year for the new army to crush the uprising, but
15824-403: The army was fixed, where each domain was required to send ten men for each 10,000 koku of rice produced. However, this policy put the imperial government in direct competition with the domains for military recruitment, which was not rectified until April 1868, when the government banned the domains from enlisting troops. Consequently, the quota system never fully worked as intended and was abolished
16008-471: The army would undertake immediate landings on the coast between Shanhaiguan and Tianjin, and advance to the Zhili plain in order to defeat the main Chinese forces and bring the war to a swift conclusion. If neither side gained control of the sea and supremacy, the army would concentrate on the occupation of Korea and exclude Chinese influence there. Lastly, if the navy was defeated and consequently lost command of
16192-416: The army, those who failed the exam were excused from all examinations except for the national guard. Recruits who passed entered the draft lottery, where some were selected for active duty. A smaller group would be selected for replacement duty ( hojū-eki ) should anything happen to any of the active duty soldiers; the rest were dismissed. One of the primary differences between the samurai and the peasant class
16376-419: The bakufu and others opposing the imperial government. Local villagers were routinely impressed as porters to move and deliver supplies between the depots and frontline units. Initially, the new army fought under makeshift arrangements, with unclear channels of command and control and no reliable recruiting base. Although fighting for the imperial cause, many of the units were loyal to their domains rather than
16560-480: The better-known examples of Japanese New Wave filmmaking. Documentary played a crucial role in the New Wave, as directors such as Hani, Kazuo Kuroki , Toshio Matsumoto , and Hiroshi Teshigahara moved from documentary into fiction film, while feature filmmakers like Oshima and Imamura also made documentaries. Shinsuke Ogawa and Noriaki Tsuchimoto became the most important documentarists: "two figures [that] tower over
16744-470: The bombing of Tokyo during World War II, and the natural effects of time and Japan's humidity on flammable and unstable nitrate film have resulted in a great dearth of surviving films from this period. Unlike in the West, silent films were still being produced in Japan well into the 1930s; as late as 1938, a third of Japanese films were silent. For instance, Yasujirō Ozu 's An Inn in Tokyo (1935), considered
16928-490: The cause for reform. At Taikatsu, Thomas Kurihara directed films scripted by the novelist Junichiro Tanizaki , who was a strong advocate of film reform. Even Nikkatsu produced reformist films under the direction of Eizō Tanaka . By the mid-1920s, actresses had replaced onnagata and films used more of the devices pioneered by Inoue. Some of the most discussed silent films from Japan are those of Kenji Mizoguchi , whose later works (including Ugetsu / Ugetsu Monogatari ) retain
17112-405: The children. Kamishibai was often used to tell stories of Buddhist deities and the history of some Buddhist temples. In 1920 it started out as normal storytelling for the children. But in about 1932 it started to lean more to a militaristic viewpoint. Yoshiko Yamaguchi was a very popular actress. She rose to international stardom with 22 wartime movies. The Manchukuo Film Association let her use
17296-557: The cinema audience drop due to the spread of television. Total audience declined from 1.2 billion in 1960 to 0.2 billion in 1980. Film companies refused to hire top actors and directors, not even the companies' production skills to the television industry, thereby making the film companies losing money. Film companies fought back in various ways, such as the bigger budget films of Kadokawa Pictures , or including increasingly sexual or violent content and language which could not be shown on television. The resulting pink film industry became
17480-476: The city. The allies then consolidated and awaited the remainder of the 5th Division and other coalition reinforcements. In early August, the expedition pushed towards the capital where on August 14, it lifted the Boxer siege. By that time, the 13,000-strong Japanese force was the largest single contingent, making up about 40 percent of the approximately 33,000 strong allied expeditionary force. Japanese troops involved in
17664-526: The command of British Admiral Edward Seymour, departed by rail, from Tianjin, for the legations in early June. On June 12, mixed Boxer and Chinese regular army forces halted the advance, some 30 miles from the capital. The road-bound and badly outnumbered allies withdrew to the vicinity of Tianjin , having suffered more than 300 casualties. The army general staff in Tokyo became aware of the worsening conditions in China and had drafted ambitious contingency plans, but
17848-466: The commercially successful Tora-San series , while also directing other films, notably the popular The Yellow Handkerchief , which won the first Japan Academy Prize for Best Film in 1978. New wave filmmakers Susumu Hani and Shōhei Imamura retreated to documentary work , though Imamura made a dramatic return to feature filmmaking with Vengeance Is Mine (1979). Dodes'ka-den by Akira Kurosawa and Sandakan No. 8 by Kei Kumai were nominated to
18032-529: The country was made up of feudal domains ( han ) with the Tokugawa shogunate ( bakufu ) in overall control, which had ruled Japan since 1603. The bakufu army, although a large force, was only one among others, and bakufu efforts to control the nation depended upon the cooperation of its vassals' armies. The opening of the country after two centuries of seclusion subsequently led to the Meiji Restoration and
18216-575: The creation of an Imperial Guard ( Goshinpei ) of six thousand men, consisting of nine infantry battalions, two artillery batteries and two cavalry squadrons. The emperor donated 100,000 ryō to underwrite the new unit, which was subordinate to the court. It was composed of members of the Satsuma, Chōshū and Tosa domains, who had led the restoration. Satsuma provided four battalions of infantry and four artillery batteries; Chōshū provided three battalions of infantry; Tosa two battalions of infantry, two squadrons of cavalry, and two artillery batteries. For
18400-619: The critically and commercially successful Late Spring in 1949. In the later half of the Occupation, the Reverse Course came into effect. Left-wing filmmakers displaced from the major studios in the Red Purge joined those displaced after suppression of the Toho strikes , forming a new independent film movement. Directors such as Fumio Kamei , Tadashi Imai and Satsuo Yamamoto were members of
18584-498: The declaration of war, the two service staffs developed a two-stage operational plan against China. The army's 5th Division would land at Chemulpo to prevent a Chinese advance in Korea while the navy would engage the Beiyang fleet in a decisive battle in order to secure control of the seas. If the navy defeated the Chinese fleet decisively and secured command of the seas, the larger part of
18768-515: The effects the war and subsequent occupation by America in unique and innovative ways. During this decade, the works of Kurosawa, Honda, and Tsuburaya would become the first Japanese films to be widely distributed in foreign theaters. The decade started with Akira Kurosawa 's Rashomon (1950), which won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 1951 and the Academy Honorary Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1952, and marked
18952-454: The entrance of Japanese cinema onto the world stage. It was also the breakout role for legendary star Toshiro Mifune . In 1953, Entotsu no mieru basho by Heinosuke Gosho was in competition at the 3rd Berlin International Film Festival . The first Japanese film in color was Carmen Comes Home directed by Keisuke Kinoshita and released in 1951. There was also a black-and-white version of this film available. Tokyo File 212 (1951)
19136-664: The entry to the Bohai Gulf, in mid-October. While, the First Army pursued the remaining Chinese forces from Korea across the Yalu River, Second Army occupied the city of Dairen on November 8 and then seized the fortress and harbor at Port Arthur on November 25. Farther north, the First army's offensive stalled and was beset by supply problems and winter weather. In 1899–1900, Boxer attacks against foreigners in China intensified, resulting in
19320-504: The expense of the domains advocated for the creation of a standing national army along European lines under the control of the government , the introduction of conscription for commoners and the abolition of the samurai class. Ōkubo Toshimichi preferred a small volunteer force consisting of former samurai. Ōmura's views for modernizing Japan's military led to his assassination in 1869 and his ideas were largely implemented after his death by Yamagata Aritomo . Aritomo has been described as
19504-580: The father of the Imperial Japanese Army. Yamagata had commanded mixed commoner-samurai Chōshū units during the Boshin War and was convinced of the merit of peasant soldiers. Although he himself was part of the samurai class, albeit of insignificant lower status, Yamagata distrusted the warrior class, several members of whom he regarded as clear dangers to the Meiji state. In March 1871, the War Ministry announced
19688-470: The fighting had acquitted themselves well, although a British military observer felt their aggressiveness, densely packed formations, and over-willingness to attack cost them excessive casualties. For example, during the Tianjin fighting, the Japanese, while comprising less than one quarter (3,800) of the total allied force of 17,000, suffered more than half of the casualties, 400 out of 730. Similarly at Beijing,
19872-482: The film industry. In his 1917 film The Captain's Daughter (based on the play by Choji Nakauchi , based in turn on the German film, Gendarm Möbius ), Masao Inoue started using techniques new to the silent film era, such as the close-up and cut back. The Pure Film Movement was central in the development of the gendaigeki and scriptwriting . New studios established around 1920, such as Shochiku and Taikatsu , aided
20056-453: The film's release, the careers of each man took different arcs: Mifune continued to enjoy success with a range of samurai and war-themed films ( Rebellion , Samurai Assassin , The Emperor and a General , among others). In contrast, Kurosawa's output of films dwindled and drew mixed responses. During this time, Kurosawa attempted suicide. In 1980, Mifune experienced popularity with mainstream American audiences through his role as Lord Toranaga in
20240-596: The first Japanese color movie to be released outside Japan, receiving an Academy Honorary Award in 1954 for Best Costume Design by Sanzo Wada and an Honorary Award for Best Foreign Language Film. It also won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival , the first Japanese film to achieve that honour. The year 1954 saw two of Japan's most influential films released. The first was the Kurosawa epic Seven Samurai , about
20424-400: The first time, the Meiji government was able to organize a large body of soldiers under a consistent rank and pay scheme with uniforms, which were loyal to the government rather than the domains. The Imperial Guard's principal mission was to protect the throne by suppressing domestic samurai revolts, peasant uprisings and anti-government demonstrations. The possession of this military force was
20608-552: The first to shoot films in Japan. Moving pictures, however, were not an entirely new experience for the Japanese because of their rich tradition of pre-cinematic devices such as gentō ( utsushi-e ) or the magic lantern . The first successful Japanese film in late 1897 showed sights in Tokyo. In 1898, some ghost films were made, such as the Shirō Asano shorts Bake Jizo (Jizo the Spook / 化け地蔵) and Shinin no sosei (Resurrection of
20792-457: The following year. The Imperial forces encountered numerous difficulties during the war, especially during the campaign in Eastern Japan. Headquarters in faraway Kyoto often proposed plans at odds with the local conditions, which led to tensions with officers in the field, who in many cases ignored centralized direction in favor of unilateral action. The army lacked a strong central staff that
20976-410: The foreign menace, little substantive planning was directed against Russia. In February 1872, the military ministry was abolished and separate army and navy ministries were established. The conscription ordinance enacted on January 10, 1873, made universal military service compulsory for all male subjects in the country. The law called for a total of seven years of military service: three years in
21160-653: The government, in light of the Triple Intervention refused to deploy large forces unless requested by the western powers. However, three days later, the general staff did dispatch a provisional force of 1,300 troops, commanded by Major General Fukushima Yasumasa , to northern China. Fukushima was chosen because his ability to speak fluent English which enabled him to communicate with the British commander. The force landed near Tianjin on July 5. On June 17, with tensions increasing, naval Rikusentai from Japanese ships had joined British, Russian, and German sailors to seize
21344-443: The hardships soldiers face everyday in battle. Marching through mud and staying in small unknown towns. In 1942, Kajiro Yamamoto 's film The War at Sea from Hawaii to Malaya portrayed the attack on Pearl Harbor ; the film made use of special effects directed by Eiji Tsuburaya , including a miniature scale model of Pearl Harbor itself. Kamishibai (紙芝居) or paper theater was a popular form of street entertainment, especially for
21528-612: The help of Akira Kurosawa , convinced the Yoshimine family to allow the marriage. The wedding took place in February 1950 at the Aoyama Gakuin Methodist Church. Yoshimine was a Buddhist but since Mifune was a Christian , they were married in church as per Christian tradition . In November of the same year, their first son, Shirō was born. In 1955, they had a second son, Takeshi. Mifune's daughter Mika [ ja ]
21712-510: The imperial and shogunate forces marked the beginning of the conflict. With the court in Kyoto firmly behind the Satsuma-Chōshū-Tosa coalition, other domains that were sympathetic to the cause – such as Tottori ( Inaba ) , Aki ( Hiroshima ) , and Hizen ( Saga ) – emerged to take a more active role in military operations. Western domains that had either supported
21896-419: The imperial court. In March 1869, the imperial government created various administrative offices, including a military branch; and in the following month organized an imperial bodyguard of 400 to 500, which consisted of Satsuma and Chōshū troops strengthened by veterans of the encounter at Toba–Fushimi, as well as yeoman and masterless samurai from various domains. The imperial court told the domains to restrict
22080-442: The imperial court: firstly, to legitimize its cause; secondly, to brand enemies of the imperial government as enemies of the court and traitors; and, lastly, to gain popular support. To supply food, weapons, and other supplies for the campaign, the imperial government established logistical relay stations along three major highways. These small depots held stockpiled material supplied by local pro-government domains, or confiscated from
22264-473: The imperial institution. Top-ranking military leaders were given direct access to the Emperor and the authority to transmit his pronouncements directly to the troops. The sympathetic relationship between conscripts and officers, particularly junior officers who were drawn mostly from the peasantry, tended to draw the military closer to the people. In time, most people came to look more for guidance in national matters more to military than to political leaders. By
22448-546: The landscape of Japanese documentary." Teshigahara's Woman in the Dunes (1964) won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival , and was nominated for Best Director and Best Foreign Language Film Oscars . Masaki Kobayashi's Kwaidan (1965) also picked up the Special Jury Prize at Cannes and received a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards. Bushido, Samurai Saga by Tadashi Imai won
22632-400: The largest film production company in Japan, was conducting a massive talent search, during which hundreds of aspiring actors auditioned before a team of judges. Kurosawa was originally going to skip the event, but showed up when Hideko Takamine told him of one actor who seemed especially promising. Kurosawa later wrote that he entered the audition to see "a young man reeling around the room in
22816-439: The military yen – or "Japanese invasion money", as it came to be known by the locals – was the only legal tender in circulation. The Japanese authorities seized or ordered surrendered all other bank notes in territories under their occupation and provided compensation at an "exchange rate" as they saw fit, in the form of JMYs. This had the effect of affording Japanese soldiers in many occupied territories
23000-644: The modern army of Japan. Separately, some soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army continued to fight on isolated Pacific islands until at least the 1970s, with the last known Japanese soldier surrendering in 1974. Intelligence officer Hiroo Onoda , who surrendered on Lubang Island in the Philippines in March 1974, and Teruo Nakamura , who surrendered on the Indonesian island of Morotai in December 1974, appear to have been
23184-534: The most interesting time in Japan and let me be your tour guide." So it wound up with me learning an awful lot of stuff from Toshirô." In 1979, Mifune joined the ensemble cast of the Steven Spielberg war comedy 1941 as the commander of a lost Imperial Japanese Navy submarine searching for Hollywood shortly after the Pearl Harbor attack . Mifune received wide acclaim in the West after playing Toranaga in
23368-628: The navy was unable to bring the Beiyang fleet into battle in mid-August, temporarily withdrew from the Yellow Sea to refit and replenish its ships. As a consequence, in late August the general staff ordered an advance overland to the Zhili plain via Korea in order to capture bases on the Liaodong Peninsula to prevent Chinese forces from interfering with the drive on Beijing. The First Army with two divisions
23552-425: The need for a strong centralized authority and although the imperial side was victorious, the early Meiji government was weak and the leaders had to maintain their standing with their domains whose military forces was essential for whatever the government needed to achieve. The leaders of the restoration were divided over the future organization of the army. Ōmura Masujirō who had sought a strong central government at
23736-527: The new army created resentment among the samurai class. Although the nascent Meiji government achieved military success, the war left a residue of disgruntled warriors and marginalized commoners, together with a torn social fabric. After the defeat of the Tokugawa shogunate and operations in Northeastern Honshu and Hokkaido a true national army did not exist. Many in the restoration coalition had recognized
23920-859: The only members of the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan (MPPAJ). The annual Japan Academy Film Prize hosted by the Nippon Academy-shō Association is considered to be the Japanese equivalent of the Academy Awards . The kinetoscope , first shown commercially by Thomas Edison in the United States in 1894, was first shown in Japan in November 1896. The Vitascope and the Lumière Brothers ' Cinematograph were first presented in Japan in early 1897, by businessmen such as Inabata Katsutaro . Lumière cameramen were
24104-475: The only weakness he could find with Mifune and his acting ability was his "rough" voice), inverting the popular stereotype of the genteel, clean-cut samurai. In such films as Seven Samurai and Yojimbo , he played characters who were often comically lacking in manners, but replete with practical wisdom and experience, understated nobility, and, in the case of Yojimbo , unmatched fighting prowess. Sanjuro in particular contrasts this earthy warrior spirit with
24288-465: The original script (about "a surrogate father and son finding each other from completely different cultures") lost its "character-driven scenes" and was reduced to "a martial arts movie" but stated, "...I remember Mifune came to me, and he said, "Look, this is what's happening. I'm disappointed, and I know you are, but this is what it is. So you can either have your heart broken every day, or you can use this experience as an opportunity to be spending time in
24472-499: The outcome of the naval operations. Clashes between Chinese and Japanese forces at Pungdo and Seongwhan caused irreversible changes to Sino-Japanese relations and meant that a state of war now existed between the two countries. The two governments officially declared war on August 1. Initially, the general staff's objective was to secure the Korean peninsula before the arrival of winter and then land forces near Shanhaiguan. However, as
24656-400: The past century, when people thought of a Japanese man, they saw Toshiro Mifune. A samurai, in the world's eyes, has Mifune's fast wrists, his scruff, his sidelong squint... He may have played warriors, but they weren't typical heroes: they threw tantrums and fits, accidentally slipped off mangy horses, yawned, scratched, chortled, and lazed. But when he extended his right arm, quick and low with
24840-509: The peak years of the Japanese New Wave movement, which began in the 1950s and continued through the early 1970s. Nagisa Oshima , Kaneto Shindo , Masahiro Shinoda , Susumu Hani and Shohei Imamura emerged as major filmmakers during the decade. Oshima's Cruel Story of Youth , Night and Fog in Japan and Death by Hanging , along with Shindo's Onibaba , Hani's Kanojo to kare and Imamura's The Insect Woman , became some of
25024-606: The policies of the Occupation , such as agricultural reform and the organization of labor unions , and promoted the peaceful redevelopment of Japan and the rights of individuals . Significant movies among them are, Setsuko Hara appeared in Akira Kurosawa 's No Regrets for Our Youth (1946), Kōzaburō Yoshimura 's A Ball at the Anjo House (1947), Tadashi Imai 's Aoi sanmyaku (1949), etc. It gained national popularity as
25208-436: The provinces of Zhili , Shandong and in Manchuria, as a result of the tense situation on the Korean peninsula. These actions were planned more as an armed demonstration intended to strengthen the Chinese position in Korea, rather than as a preparation for war with Japan. On June 3, the Chinese government accepted the requests from the Korean government to send troops to help quell the rebellion, additionally they also informed
25392-431: The regular army ( jōbigun ), two years in the reserve ( dai'ichi kōbigun ), and an additional two years in the second reserve ( daini kōbigun ). All able-bodied males between the ages of 17 and 40 were considered members of the national guard ( kokumingun ), which would only see service in a severe national crisis, such as an attack or invasion of Japan. The conscription examination decided which group of recruits would enter
25576-493: The relatively small number that were available were of several different calibers , causing problems with ammunition supply. In the early months of 1894, the Donghak Peasant Revolution broke out in southern Korea and had soon spread throughout the rest of the country, threatening the Korea capital Seoul , itself. The Chinese, since the beginning of May had taken steps to prepare the mobilization of their forces in
25760-417: The rift that ended this career-spanning collaboration. Mifune had a passion for film in his own right and had long wanted to set up a production company, working towards going freelance. Kurosawa and Taniguchi advised against it out of concern they would not be able to cast Mifune as freely. Most of Mifune's contemporaries acted in several different movies in this period. Since Red Beard required Mifune to grow
25944-521: The screen and narrated silent movies. They were descendants of kabuki jōruri, kōdan storytellers, theater barkers and other forms of oral storytelling. Benshi could be accompanied by music like silent films from cinema of the West . With the advent of sound in the early 1930s, the benshi gradually declined. In 1908, Shōzō Makino , considered the pioneering director of Japanese film, began his influential career with Honnōji gassen (本能寺合戦), produced for Yokota Shōkai . Shōzō recruited Matsunosuke Onoe ,
26128-414: The sea, Japanese forces in Korea would be ordered to hang on and fight a rearguard action while the bulk of the army would remain in Japan in preparation to repel a Chinese invasion. This worst-case scenario also foresaw attempts to rescue the beleaguered 5th Division in Korea while simultaneously strengthening homeland defenses. The army's contingency plans which were both offensive and defensive, depended on
26312-454: The shogunate or remained neutral also quickly announced their support of the restoration movement. The nascent Meiji state required a new military command for its operations against the shogunate. In 1868, the "Imperial Army" being just a loose amalgam of domain armies, the government created four military divisions: the Tōkaidō , Tōsandō , San'indō , and Hokurikudō , each of which was named for
26496-526: The siege of the foreign legations at Beijing, the British ambassador offered the Japanese government one million British pounds in exchange for Japanese participation. Shortly afterward, advance units of the 5th Division departed for China, bringing Japanese strength to 3,800 personnel, of the then-17,000 allied force. The commander of the 5th Division, Lt. General Yamaguchi Motoomi, had taken operational control from Fukushima. A second, stronger allied expeditionary army stormed Tianjin , on July 14, and occupied
26680-474: The silent film star Sessue Hayakawa — often christened the "first Hollywood sex symbol" — with his long, slim fingers and Yves Saint Laurent polish. But Mifune represents a development beyond Hayakawa's Japanese-man-on-screen, who, despite his huge white female fanbase, was always limited to roles of the "Oriental" villain, the menace, the impossible romantic lead: in 1957, Joe Franklin would tell Hayakawa in his talk show, "There were two things we were sure of in
26864-608: The silent movie era; the Indians never got the best of it, and Sessue Hayakawa never got the girl." Mifune never wants the girl in the first place. So the men around him can't help but watch him a little open-mouthed, as he walks his slice of world, amused by and nonchalant about the stupor he leaves in his wake. "Who is he?," someone asks, and no one ever has a good answer. You can't help but want to walk alongside him, to figure it out. Mifune appeared in roughly 170 feature films. In 2015, Steven Okazaki released Mifune: The Last Samurai ,
27048-490: The six-month training and diligently applied himself to studying acting, although at first he still hoped to be transferred to the camera department. His imposing bearing, acting range, facility with foreign languages and lengthy partnership with acclaimed director Akira Kurosawa made him the most famous Japanese actor of his time, and easily the best known to Western audiences. He often portrayed samurai or rōnin who were usually coarse and gruff (Kurosawa once explained that
27232-433: The size of their local armies and to contribute to funding a national officers' training school in Kyoto. However, within a few months the government disbanded both the military branch and the imperial bodyguard: the former was ineffective while the latter lacked modern weaponry and equipment. To replace them, two new organizations were created. One was the military affairs directorate which was composed of two bureaus, one for
27416-404: The star of most of Akira Kurosawa's classics became the first Japanese actor since Sessue Hayakawa to have international fame. But where Hayakawa became a sex symbol because he was romantic, exotic, and suavely charming (even when playing lecherous villains), Mifune's sex appeal – and appeal to male viewers – was due to his sheer unrefined and uninhibited masculinity. He was attractive even when he
27600-589: The stepping stone for many young independent filmmakers. The seventies also saw the start of the " idol eiga ", films starring young "idols" , who would bring in audiences due to their fame and popularity. Toshiya Fujita made the revenge film Lady Snowblood in 1973. In the same year, Yoshishige Yoshida made the film Coup d'État , a portrait of Ikki Kita , the leader of the Japanese coup of February 1936. Its experimental cinematography and mise-en-scène, as well as its avant-garde score by Toshi Ichiyanagi , garnered it wide critical acclaim within Japan. In 1976,
27784-529: The support of the Army in order to survive. The Army controlled the appointment of the War Minister, and in 1936 a law was passed that stipulated that only an active duty general or lieutenant-general could hold the post. As a result, military spending as a proportion of the national budget rose disproportionately in the 1920s and 1930s, and various factions within the military exerted disproportionate influence on Japanese foreign policy. The Imperial Japanese Army
27968-610: The television miniseries Shogun , which Kurosawa criticised for its historical inaccuracy. Mifune spoke respectfully of Kurosawa and loyally attended the premiere of Kagemusha . Mifune turned down an opportunity from United Artists to play the Japanese spy chief Tiger Tanaka in the James Bond film You Only Live Twice (1967). According to his daughter, he also turned down an offer from George Lucas to play either Darth Vader or Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars (1977). Mifune himself
28152-590: The third French military mission to Japan (1884–89) . However, after France's defeat in 1871 the Japanese government switched to the victorious Germans as a model. From 1886 to April 1890, it hired German military advisors (Major Jakob Meckel , replaced in 1888 by von Wildenbrück and Captain von Blankenbourg) to assist in the training of the Japanese General Staff. In 1878, the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office, based on
28336-646: The two road junctions of Toba and Fushimi just south of Kyoto, the two forces clashed. On the second day, an Imperial banner was given to the defending troops and a member of the Imperial Family, the Prince Ninnaji , was named nominal commander in chief , in effect making the pro-imperial forces officially an Imperial army. The bakufu forces eventually retreated to Osaka, with the remaining forces ordered to retreat to Edo. Yoshinobu and his closest advisors left for Edo by ship. The encounter at Toba–Fushimi between
28520-483: The useless, sheltered propriety of the court samurai. Kurosawa valued Mifune highly for his effortless portrayal of unvarnished emotion, once commenting that he could convey in only three feet of film an emotion for which the average Japanese actor would require ten feet. He starred in all three films of Hiroshi Inagaki 's Samurai Trilogy (1954–1956), for which the first film in Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto
28704-486: The victories proved critical in creating and stabilizing the Imperial government and to realize sweeping social, economic and political reforms that enabled Japan to become a modern state that could stand comparison to France, Germany, and other Western European powers. The early Imperial Japanese Army was developed with the assistance of advisors from France, through the second French military mission to Japan (1872–80) , and
28888-565: The war experience became a public phenomenon. Other films produced include Battleship Yamato (1953) and Eagle of the Pacific (1953). Under these circumstances, movies such as Emperor Meiji and the Russo-Japanese War (明治天皇と日露大戦争, 1957), where Kanjūrō Arashi played Emperor Meiji , also appeared. It was a situation that was unthinkable before the war, the commercialization of the Emperor who
29072-478: The weak economy, unemployment became widespread in Japan, and the cinema industry suffered. During this period, when Japan was expanding its empire, the Japanese government saw cinema as a propaganda tool to show the glory and invincibility of the Empire of Japan . Thus, many films from this period depict patriotic and militaristic themes. However unlike most wartime films the Japanese tended to tell it like it is, showing
29256-412: The wealthy. Under the new 1873 ordinance, the conscript army was composed mainly of second and third sons of impoverished farmers who manned the regional garrisons, while former samurai controlled the Imperial Guard and the Tokyo garrison. Initially, because of the army's small size and numerous exemptions, relatively few young men were actually conscripted for a three-year term on active duty. In 1873,
29440-435: The wild. For the Mexican film Ánimas Trujano , he studied tapes of Mexican actors speaking so that he could recite all of his lines in Spanish . Many Mexicans believed that Toshiro Mifune could have passed for a native of Oaxaca due to his critically acclaimed performance. When asked why he chose Mexico to do his next film, Mifune quoted, "Simply because, first of all, Mr. Ismael Rodríguez convinced me; secondly, because I
29624-526: Was Until We Meet Again by Tadashi Imai . The number of films produced, and the cinema audience reached a peak in the 1960s. Most films were shown in double bills, with one half of the bill being a "program picture" or B movie . A typical program picture was shot in four weeks. The demand for these program pictures in quantity meant the growth of film series such as The Hoodlum Soldier or Akumyo . The huge level of activity of 1960s Japanese cinema also resulted in many classics. Akira Kurosawa directed
29808-484: Was Yoshio Sugino of the Tenshin Shōden Katori Shintō-ryū . Sugino created the fight choreography for films such as Seven Samurai and Yojimbo , and Kurosawa instructed his actors to emulate his movements and bearing. Clint Eastwood was among the first of many actors to adopt this wandering ronin with no name persona for foreign films, which he used to great effect in his Western roles, especially in Spaghetti Westerns directed by Sergio Leone where he played
29992-468: Was a supreme action hero whose bloody, ritualistic, and, ironically, sometimes comical sword-fight sequences in Yojimbo and Sanjuro are classics, as well-choreographed as the greatest movie dances. His nameless sword-for-hire anticipated Clint Eastwood 's ' Man With No Name ' gunfighter. With his intelligence, eyes seemingly in back of his head, and experience evident in every thrust or slice, he has no trouble – and no pity – dispatching twenty opponents at
30176-400: Was a trade merchant and photographer who ran a photography business in Qingdao and Yingkou , and was originally the son of a medical doctor from Kawauchi, Akita Prefecture . His mother Sen was the daughter of a hatamoto , a high-ranking samurai official. Toshiro's parents, who were working as Methodist missionaries , were some of the Japanese citizens encouraged to live in Shandong by
30360-425: Was activated on September 1. In mid-September 17, the Chinese forces defeated at Pyongyang and occupied the city, as the remaining Chinese troops retreated northward. The navy's stunning victory in the Yalu on September 17, was crucial to the Japanese as it allowed the Second Army with three divisions and one brigade to land unopposed on the Liaodong Peninsula about 100 miles north of Port Arthur which controlled
30544-455: Was always professional, memorizing all of his lines and not carrying scripts on set. He was unusually humble for an international star, and was known for treating his co-stars and crew very generously, throwing lavish catered parties for them and paying for their families to go to onsen resorts. When American actor Scott Glenn was asked about his experience of filming The Challenge (1982) alongside Mifune, Glenn recalled disappointment that
30728-452: Was awarded an Honorary Academy Award . Mifune and Inagaki worked together on twenty films, which outnumbered his collaborations with Kurosawa, with all but two falling into the jidaigeki genre, most notably with Rickshaw Man (1958), which won the Venice Film Festival Golden Lion . He was also known for the effort he put into his performances. To prepare for Seven Samurai and Rashomon , Mifune reportedly studied footage of lions in
30912-561: Was born to his mistress, actress Mika Kitagawa, in 1982. In 1992, Mifune began suffering from a serious unknown health problem. It has been variously suggested that he destroyed his health with overwork, suffered a heart attack , or experienced a stroke . He retreated from public life and remained largely confined to his home, cared for by his estranged wife Sachiko. When she died from pancreatic cancer in 1995, Mifune's physical and mental state declined rapidly. On December 24, 1997, he died in Mitaka , Tokyo , of multiple organ failure at
31096-488: Was capable of enforcing orders. Consequently, military units were at the mercy of individual commanders' leadership and direction. This was not helped by the absence of a unified tactical doctrine, which left units to fight according to the tactics favored by their respective commanders. There was increased resentment by many lower ranked commanders as senior army positions were monopolized by the nobility together with samurai from Chōshū and Satsuma. The use of commoners within
31280-463: Was completed in 1961, with A Soldier's Prayer . Kenji Mizoguchi, who died in 1956, ended his career with a series of masterpieces including The Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953) and Sansho the Bailiff (1954). He won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival for Ugetsu . Mizoguchi's films often deal with the tragedies inflicted on women by Japanese society. Mikio Naruse made Repast (1950), Late Chrysanthemums (1954), Sound of
31464-563: Was dominant, but opposed by leftist critics such as Akira Iwasaki and Genjū Sasa who sought an ideological critique of films. The 1930s also saw increased government involvement in cinema, which was symbolized by the passing of the Film Law , which gave the state more authority over the film industry, in 1939. The government encouraged some forms of cinema, producing propaganda films and promoting documentary films (also called bunka eiga or "culture films"), with important documentaries being made by directors such as Fumio Kamei . Realism
31648-488: Was eager to work in beautiful Mexico, of great tradition; and thirdly, because the story and character of 'Animas Trujano' seemed very human to me". The film was nominated for both a Golden Globe and an Oscar . Mifune gave a Japanese pistol as a gift to then-Mexican president Adolfo López Mateos when they met in Oaxaca. Mifune has been credited as originating the "roving warrior" archetype, which he perfected during his collaboration with Kurosawa. His martial arts instructor
31832-432: Was earning equivalent to the maximum salary of an Imperial Japanese major, or the base salary of an Imperial Japanese lieutenant colonel, and about 25 times as much as an Imperial Japanese soldier of the same rank. While disproportionate salary ranges were not uncommon between militaries during World War II, for example Australian enlistees could expect to receive roughly triple as much in pay as their counterparts fighting for
32016-508: Was full, telling Mifune he could later transfer to the Photography Department if he wished. He was accepted, along with 48 others (out of roughly 4,000 applicants), and allowed to take a screen test for Kajirō Yamamoto . Instructed to mime anger, he drew from his wartime experiences. Yamamoto took a liking to Mifune, recommending him to director Senkichi Taniguchi . This led to Mifune's first feature role, in Shin Baka Jidai . Mifune first encountered director Akira Kurosawa when Toho Studios ,
32200-469: Was in favor; film theorists such as Taihei Imamura and Heiichi Sugiyama advocated for documentary or realist drama, while directors such as Hiroshi Shimizu and Tomotaka Tasaka produced fiction films that were strongly realistic in style. Films reinforced the importance of traditional Japanese values against the rise of the Westernised modern girl , a character epitomised by Shizue Tatsuta in Ozu's 1930 film Young Lady . Because of World War II and
32384-427: Was inducted into the Martial Arts History Museum Hall of Fame . He is the subject of the featured-length documentary, Mifune: The Last Samurai (2015), about his life and his films. In 2016, his name was inscribed on the Hollywood Walk of Fame . Toshiro Mifune was born on April 1, 1920, in Seitō , Japanese-occupied Shandong (present-day Qingdao, China ), the eldest son of Tokuzo and Sen Mifune. His father Tokuzo
32568-452: Was originally known simply as the Army ( rikugun ) but after 1928, as part of the Army's turn toward romantic nationalism and also in the service of its political ambitions, it re-titled itself the Imperial Army ( kōgun ). In 1923, the army consisted of 21 divisions, but in accordance with the 1924 reform it was reduced to 17 divisions. Two leaps in the development of the military industry (1906–1910 and 1931–1934) made it possible to re-equip
32752-451: Was stationed in China. A further 13 divisions defended the Mongolian border, due to concerns about a possible attack by the Soviet Union. From 1942, soldiers were sent to Hong Kong (23rd Army), the Philippines (14th Army), Thailand (15th Army), Burma (15th Army), Dutch East Indies (16th Army), and Malaya (25th Army). By 1945, there were 6 million soldiers in the Imperial Japanese Army. From 1943, Japanese troops suffered from
32936-484: Was such that he said in a single action what took ordinary actors three separate movements to express. He put forth everything directly and boldly, and his sense of timing was the keenest I had ever seen in a Japanese actor. And yet with all his quickness, he also had surprisingly fine sensibilities. "Since I came into the industry very inexperienced, I don't have any theory of acting. I just had to play my roles my way." "Generally speaking, most East–West stories have been
33120-460: Was supposed to be sacred and inviolable. The period after the American Occupation led to a rise in diversity in movie distribution thanks to the increased output and popularity of the film studios of Toho , Daiei , Shochiku , Nikkatsu , and Toei . This period gave rise to the six great artists of Japanese cinema: Masaki Kobayashi , Akira Kurosawa , Ishirō Honda , Eiji Tsuburaya , Kenji Mizoguchi , and Yasujirō Ozu . Each director dealt with
33304-429: Was that the production of jidaigeki films, especially those involving samurai , became effectively impossible. A notable case of censorship was of the war film Escape at Dawn , written by Akira Kurosawa and Senkichi Taniguchi , which was re-written over a dozen times at the request of CIE, largely erasing the original content of the story. On the other hand, the CIE favored the production of films that reflected
33488-420: Was the first American feature film to be shot entirely in Japan. The lead roles were played by Florence Marly and Robert Peyton . It featured the geisha Ichimaru in a short cameo. Suzuki Ikuzo's Tonichi Enterprises Company co-produced the film. Gate of Hell , a 1953 film by Teinosuke Kinugasa , was the first movie that filmed using Eastmancolor film, Gate of Hell was both Daiei 's first color film and
33672-421: Was the right to bear arms; this ancient privilege was suddenly extended to every male in the nation. There were several exemptions, including criminals, those who could show hardship, the physically unfit, heads of households or heirs, students, government bureaucrats, and teachers. A conscript could also purchase an exemption for ¥ 270, which was an enormous sum for the time and which restricted this privilege to
33856-664: Was unshaven and unwashed, drunk, wide-eyed, and openly scratching himself all over his sweaty body, as if he were a flea-infested dog. He did indeed have animal magnetism – in fact, he based his wild, growling, scratching, superhyper Samurai recruit in The Seven Samurai on a lion. It shouldn't be forgotten that Mifune was terrific in Kurosawa's contemporary social dramas, as detectives or doctors, wearing suits and ties, but he will always be remembered for his violent and fearless, funny, morally ambivalent samurai heroes for Kurosawa, as well as in Hiroshi Inagaki's classic epic, The Samurai Trilogy . Peary also wrote, Amazingly physical, [Mifune]
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