Akira Kurosawa

Director · 1910–1998 · Shinagawa, Tokyo Prefecture, Japan

Highest rated as cast or director

Biography

Akira Kurosawa (黒澤明) was a Japanese filmmaker and painter who directed thirty films in a career spanning over five decades. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers in the history of cinema. He displayed a bold, dynamic style, strongly influenced by Western cinema yet distinct from it; he was involved with all aspects of film production. Kurosawa entered the Japanese film industry in 1936, following a brief stint as a painter. After years of working on numerous films as an assistant director and scriptwriter, he made his debut as a director during World War II with the popular action film Sanshiro Sugata (1943). After the war, the critically acclaimed Drunken Angel (1948), in which Kurosawa cast the then little-known actor Toshiro Mifune in a starring role, cemented the director's reputation as one of the most important young filmmakers in Japan. The two men would go on to collaborate on another fifteen films. Rashomon (1950), which premiered in Tokyo, became the surprise winner of the Golden Lion at the 1951 Venice Film Festival. The commercial and critical success of that film opened up Western film markets for the first time to the products of the Japanese film industry, which in turn led to international recognition for other Japanese filmmakers. Kurosawa directed approximately one film per year throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, including a number of highly regarded (and often adapted) films, such as Ikiru (1952), Seven Samurai (1954), Throne of Blood (1957), Yojimbo (1961) and High and Low (1963). After the 1960s he became much less prolific; even so, his later work—including two of his final films, Kagemusha (1980) and Ran (1985)—continued to receive great acclaim. In 1990, he accepted the Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement. Posthumously, he was named Asian of the Century in the Arts, Literature, and Culture category by AsianWeek magazine and CNN, cited there as being among the five people who most prominently contributed to the improvement of Asia in the 20th century. His career has been honored by many retrospectives, critical studies and biographies in both print and video, and by releases in many consumer media.

Directed 55

1990s

1980s

1985
Ran
Director
88
1980
Kagemusha
Director
82

1970s

1975
Dersu Uzala
Director
79
1970
Dodes'ka-den
Director
73
Song of the Horse
Director

1960s

1950s

1958
The Hidden Fortress
Director
85
1957
The Lower Depths
Director
Throne of Blood
Director
84
1955
I Live in Fear
Director
73
1954
Seven Samurai
Director
91
1952
Ikiru
Director
88
The Men Who Tread on the Tiger's Tail
Director
1951
The Idiot
Director
68
1950
Rashomon
Director
88
Scandal
Director
75

1940s

1949
Stray Dog
Director
83
The Quiet Duel
Director
1948
Drunken Angel
Director
81
1947
One Wonderful Sunday
Director
1946
No Regrets for Our Youth
Director
Those Who Make Tomorrow
Director
1945
Sanshiro Sugata, Part Two
Director
1944
The Most Beautiful
Director
1943
Sanshiro Sugata
Director
1941
Horse
Assistant Director
1940
The Monkey King
Assistant Director
Roppa's Honeymoon
Assistant Director

1930s

1939
Easy Alley
Assistant Director
Enoken’s Shrewd Period
Assistant Director
1938
Enoken's Surprising Life
Assistant Director
Composition Class
Assistant Director
Tojuro's Love
Assistant Director
Subterranean Heat
Assistant Director
1937
The Beautiful Hawk
Assistant Director
Enoken's Chikiri Kinta Part 2 – Returning Is Scary, but the Weather Will Clear If You Wait
Third Assistant Director
Enoken's Chikiri Kinta Part 1 – Momma, the Hat: The Nice Way
Third Assistant Director
Avalanche
Assistant Director
Japanese Women's Textbook
Third Assistant Director
A Husband's Chastity: Fall Again
Third Assistant Director
A Husband's Chastity: If Spring Comes & Fall Once Again
Third Assistant Director
A Husband's Chastity: If Spring Comes
Third Assistant Director
Saga of the Vagabonds, Part Two: Forward at Dawn
Third Assistant Director
Saga of the Vagabonds, Part One: Tiger and Wolf
Third Assistant Director
1936
Tokyo Rhapsody
Third Assistant Director
Enoken’s Ten Millions Sequel
Third Assistant Director
Enoken’s Ten Millions
Third Assistant Director
Paradise of the Virgin Flowers
Assistant Director