Nagamasa Kawakita

Last updated
Nagamasa Kawakita

Kawakita Nagamasa - eiga no tomo 1952-11.jpg

1952
Born(1903-04-20)April 20, 1903
Tokyo, Japan
Died May 24, 1981(1981-05-24) (aged 78)
Occupation Film importer/exporter
Film producer

Nagamasa Kawakita(川喜多長政,Kawakita Nagamasa, April 20, 1903 – May 24, 1981) was a Japanese entrepreneur, film producer and importer. Together with his wife Kashiko Kawakita and daughter Kazuko Kawakita, he was instrumental in the development of the Japanese film industry, sponsoring actors and actresses, and in promoting Japanese cinema to overseas audiences. [1]

Kashiko Kawakita Japanese film critic and producer

Kashiko Kawakita was a Japanese film producer and film curator, and the wife of Nagamasa Kawakita. As vice president of Tōwa Trading, together with her husband and daughter Kazuko Kawakita she was influential in the development of the post-war Japanese film industry, sponsoring actors and actresses, and in promoting Japanese cinema to overseas audiences.

Contents

Biography

Early life

Kawakita was born in Tokyo. His father, Kawakita Daijiro, a highly decorated officer in the Imperial Japanese Army during the Russo-Japanese War, and subsequently an instructor at the Baoding Military Academy in Beijing, was killed under mysterious circumstances, possibly for treason by Japanese agents. [2] Following graduation from high school in Japan, Kawakita travelled to China in 1922 to study at Beijing University [2] and continued on to Heidelberg in Germany for further studies. He was hired by the German movie company Universum Film AG and sent back to Japan as its representative. [1]

Imperial Japanese Army Official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan, from 1868 to 1945

The Imperial Japanese Army was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor of Japan as supreme commander of the army and the navy. Later an Inspectorate General of Aviation became the third agency with oversight of the army. During wartime or national emergencies, the nominal command functions of the emperor would be centralized in an Imperial General Headquarters (IGHQ), an ad-hoc body consisting of the chief and vice chief of the Army General Staff, the Minister of the Army, the chief and vice chief of the Naval General Staff, the Inspector General of Aviation, and the Inspector General of Military Training.

Russo-Japanese War war between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan

The Russo-Japanese War was fought during 1904-1905 between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and Korea. The major theatres of operations were the Liaodong Peninsula and Mukden in Southern Manchuria and the seas around Korea, Japan and the Yellow Sea.

Baoding Military Academy was a military academy based in Baoding, Republican China, in the first two decades of the 20th century. For a time, it was the most important military academy in China, and its cadets played prominent roles in the political and military history of the Republic of China. The Baoding Military Academy closed in 1923, but served as a model for the Whampoa Military Academy, which was founded in Guangzhou in 1924. During the Second Sino-Japanese War, half of 300 divisions in China's armed forces were commanded by Whampoa graduates and one-third were Baoding cadets.

Pre-war career

Kawakita formed his own company, Towa Trading in October 1928. [2] He met his wife, Kashiko, when she came to work at the company as his secretary, and they used their honeymoon in 1932 to make the first of many trips to Europe to acquire movies for the Japanese market. Among his earliest successes were Leontine Sagan's Mädchen in Uniform , although he also worked with many other European directors, including G. W. Pabst, René Clair, Fritz Lang and Julien Duvivier. The films Kawakita imported were released to the market via Toho Studios. Kawakita also brought Japanese films to the Venice Film Festival and other overseas venues. [1]

Leontine Sagan Austrian-Hungarian stage and film director

Leontine Sagan was an Austrian-Hungarian theatre director and actress of Jewish descent. She is best known for directing Mädchen in Uniform (1931).

<i>Mädchen in Uniform</i> 1931 film by Leontine Sagan

Mädchen in Uniform is a 1931 German feature-length film based on the play Gestern und heute by Christa Winsloe and directed by Leontine Sagan with artistic direction from Carl Froelich, who also funded the film. Winsloe also wrote the screenplay and was on the set during filming. The film remains an international cult classic.

G. W. Pabst Austrian film director

Georg Wilhelm Pabst was an Austrian film director and screenwriter. He started as an actor and theater director, before becoming one of the most influential German-language filmmakers during the Weimar Republic.

In 1937, he played an important role in the 1937 German-Japanese joint venture The Daughter of the Samurai , directed by Arnold Fanck and Mansaku Itami. In the 1938 Venice International Film Festival, Five Scouts (Gonin no sekkōhei) by Tomotaka Tasaka was nominated best film, the first time a Japanese film had won a major award at an overseas film festival. [3]

<i>The Daughter of the Samurai</i> 1937 film by Arnold Fanck, Mansaku Itami

The Daughter of the Samurai is a 1937 German-Japanese drama film directed by Arnold Fanck and Mansaku Itami and starring Setsuko Hara, Ruth Eweler and Sessue Hayakawa. Its Japanese title was Atarashiki tsuchi, meaning "New Earth." It was the first of two co-productions between Japan and Nazi Germany. Franck, who was famous for making mountaineering films, was possibly chosen as director because of his connections to the Nazi Party. Fanck and Itami clashed a great deal during the film's production, and in effect created two separate versions for release in their respective countries.

Arnold Fanck was a German film director and pioneer of the mountain film genre. He is best known for the extraordinary alpine footage he captured in such films as The Holy Mountain (1926), The White Hell of Pitz Palu (1929), Storm over Mont Blanc (1930), Der weisse Rausch (1931), and S.O.S. Eisberg (1933). Fanck was also instrumental in launching the careers of several filmmakers during the Weimar years in Germany, including Leni Riefenstahl, Luis Trenker, and cinematographers Sepp Allgeier, Richard Angst, Hans Schneeberger, and Walter Riml.

Mansaku Itami Film director, screenwriter

Mansaku Itami was a Japanese film director and screenwriter known for his critical, sometimes satirical portraits of Japan and its history. He is the father of the director Juzo Itami.

In 1938, Kawakita, who was fluent in Chinese as well as in German, turned his attention to China, working on a Sino-Japanese joint venture, The Road to Peace in the Orient, directed by Shigeyoshi Suzuki, investing much of his own capital in a project which he hoped would project Sino-Japanese harmony. However, the film was a commercial failure as the Chinese public say Kawakita as a mouthpiece of the Japanese military [2] and the Japanese found the Chinese language movie with Japanese subtitled hard to understand. The Japanese Army then asked Kawakita to head the newly formed China United Productions Ltd. (or "Zhonglian" for short); a merger between Xinhua Film Company and eleven other Shanghai studios. Kawakita initially hesitated, but realized that the project would proceed with or without him. The studio produced movies with local staff and actors aimed at local Chinese audiences, and had a staff of over 3000 employees. Although Kawakita maintained relations with high-ranking officials in the Japanese military and the Nanjing Nationalist government (Shanghai mayor Chen Gongbo as honorary president), he insisted that the company act independently and to continue to pursue entertainment themes over propaganda, and thus often encountered opposition from Japanese censors and military officials, so much so that there were rumors of a plot by the Kwantung Army [2] or of the Kempeitai [4] to assassinate him.

Shigeyoshi Suzuki was a Japanese film director and screenwriter.

The Xinhua or New China Film Company, was one of the film studios to capitalize on the popularity of the leftist film movement in 1930s Shanghai, that had begun with the Mingxing and Lianhua studios. It is not related to the modern-day Xinhua News Agency. The production company lasted from 1934 until 1942, when it was absorbed into a Japanese-controlled conglomerate, Zhonglian.

Chen Gongbo Chinese politician

Chen Gongbo was a Chinese politician, noted for his role as second President of the collaborationist pro-Japanese Wang Jingwei regime during World War II.

Post-war career

After the surrender of Japan, Kawakita returned to Japan, where he was arrested by the American occupation forces and charged as a Class-B war criminal; however, he was soon released after the authorities received many statements in his defense from Chinese and Jews he had protected while in Shanghai. [1]

Surrender of Japan surrender of the Empire of Japan during the World War II

The surrender of Imperial Japan was announced on August 15 and formally signed on September 2, 1945, bringing the hostilities of World War II to a close. By the end of July 1945, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) was incapable of conducting major operations and an Allied invasion of Japan was imminent. Together with the British Empire and China, the United States called for the unconditional surrender of the Japanese armed forces in the Potsdam Declaration on July 26, 1945—the alternative being "prompt and utter destruction". While publicly stating their intent to fight on to the bitter end, Japan's leaders were privately making entreaties to the still-neutral Soviet Union to mediate peace on terms more favorable to the Japanese. Meanwhile, the Soviets were preparing to attack Japanese forces in Manchuria and Korea in fulfillment of promises they had secretly made to the United States and the United Kingdom at the Tehran and Yalta Conferences.

He was permitted to resume his position as president of Towa Trading in 1950, and changed the company name to Toho-Towa in 1951. He continued to make efforts to promote Japanese cinema overseas, and screened Rashomon by Akira Kurosawa at the Venice Film Festival in 1951 where it won the Golden Lion award. [1] He was production supervisor for the 1953 American-Japanese joint venture Anatahan, directed by Josef von Sternberg. [5]

In 1960, Kawakita established the Japan Film Library Council to promote Japanese cinema overseas and to make materials available to foreign researchers. He also was a founder of the Japan Art Theatre Guild, to promote international art film to Japan. His daughter, Kazuko Kawakita became an assistant to Akira Kurosawa on the 1960 film The Bad Sleep Well . She later married actor Juzo Itami. [1]

Kawakita was awarded the Order of the Sacred Treasures, 2nd class, in 1973. He died on May 24, 1981. [6]

Following his death, the Kawakita Award was created in 1983 to honor individuals or organizations who have contributed to the promotion of Japanese cinema overseas. Its first recipient was Donald Richie. His former home in Kamakura, Kanagawa, Japan has been turned into a memorial museum. [1]

Related Research Articles

Akira Kurosawa Japanese film director and screenwriter

Akira Kurosawa was a Japanese film director and screenwriter, who directed 30 films in a career spanning 57 years. He is regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema.

Cinema of Japan film industry of Japan

The cinema of Japan has a history that spans more than 100 years. Japan has one of the oldest and largest film industries in the world; as of 2010, 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. Movies have been produced in Japan since 1897, when the first foreign cameramen arrived. In a Sight & Sound list of the best films produced in Asia, Japanese works made up eight of the top 12, with Tokyo Story (1953) ranked number one. Japan has won the Academy Award for the Best Foreign Language Film one time, more than any other Asian country.

Toho Japanese film production company

Toho Co., Ltd. is a Japanese film, theater production, and distribution company. It has its headquarters in Yūrakuchō, Chiyoda, Tokyo, Tokyo and is one of the core companies of the Hankyu Hanshin Toho Group. Outside Japan, it is best known as the producer and distributor of many kaiju and tokusatsu films, the Chouseishin tokusatsu superhero television franchise, the films of Akira Kurosawa, and the anime films of Studio Ghibli, TMS Entertainment and OLM, Inc.. Other famous directors, including Yasujirō Ozu, Kenji Mizoguchi, Masaki Kobayashi, and Mikio Naruse, also directed films for Toho.

Toshiro Mifune Japanese actor

Toshiro Mifune was a Japanese actor who appeared in over 150 feature films. He is best known for his 16-film collaboration (1948–65) with Akira Kurosawa in such works as Rashomon, Seven Samurai, The Hidden Fortress, Throne of Blood, and Yojimbo. He also portrayed Miyamoto Musashi in Hiroshi Inagaki's Samurai Trilogy and one earlier Inagaki film, Lord Toranaga in the NBC television miniseries Shōgun, and Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto in three different films.

Juzo Itami actor, film director

Juzo Itami, born Yoshihiro Ikeuchi, was a Japanese actor, screenwriter and film director. He directed ten films, all of which he wrote himself.

Ishirō Honda Japanese film director

Ishirō Honda, sometimes miscredited in foreign releases as "Inoshiro Honda", was a Japanese film director and screenwriter. He is best known for his kaiju and tokusatsu films, including several entries in the Godzilla series, but also worked extensively in the documentary and war genres earlier in his career. Honda was also a lifelong friend and collaborator of Akira Kurosawa, and worked with Kurosawa extensively during the 1980s and 1990s.

Kamatari Fujiwara Japanese actor

Kamatari Fujiwara was a Japanese actor.

Donald Richie American writer

Donald Richie was an American-born author who wrote about the Japanese people, the culture of Japan, and especially Japanese cinema. Although he considered himself primarily a film historian, Richie also directed a number of experimental films, the first when he was 17.

<i>Rhapsody in August</i> 1991 film by Akira Kurosawa

Rhapsody in August is a 1991 Japanese film by Akira Kurosawa based on the novel Nabe no naka by Kiyoko Murata. The story centers on an elderly hibakusha, who lost her husband in the 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki, caring for her four grandchildren over the summer. She learns of a long-lost brother, Suzujiro, living in Hawaii who wants her to visit him before he dies. American film star Richard Gere appears as Suzujiro's son Clark. The film was selected as the Japanese entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 64th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.

United International Pictures is a joint venture of Paramount Pictures and Universal Pictures which distributes some of their films outside the United States and Canada. UIP also had international distribution rights to certain Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and United Artists films when MGM was part of the venture. In 2001, MGM left UIP, and signed a distribution deal with 20th Century Fox's overseas arm.

Motoyoshi Oda was a Japanese film director.

Fumio Hayasaka Japanese composer

Fumio Hayasaka was a Japanese composer of classical music and film scores.

Eternity is a controversial 1943 Chinese film made in Japanese-occupied Shanghai during the Second World War. The film was a collaborative effort between the Japanese-controlled Manchukuo Film Association and Chinese filmmakers that remained in Shanghai under the Japanese-controlled Zhonglian Productions brand.

Nobuo Nakamura was a Japanese actor, who made notable appearances in the films of Akira Kurosawa and Yasujirō Ozu in the 1950s and 1960s. Perhaps his most famous roles in the West were those of the callous deputy mayor in Kurosawa's Ikiru (1952), and the hairdresser's henpecked husband in Ozu's Tokyo Story (1953).

<i>Anatahan</i> (film) 1953 film by Josef von Sternberg

Anatahan (アナタハン), also known as The Saga of Anatahan, is a 1953 black-and-white Japanese film war drama directed by Josef von Sternberg. The World War II Japanese holdouts on Anatahan also inspired a 1998 novel, Cage on the Sea.

Daiei Film film company

Daiei Film Co. Ltd. was a Japanese film studio. Founded in 1942 as Dai Nippon Film Co., Ltd., it was one of the major studios during the postwar Golden Age of Japanese cinema, producing not only artistic masterpieces such as Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon and Kenji Mizoguchi's Ugetsu, but also such popular film series as Gamera, Daimajin, Zatoichi and Yokai Monsters. It declared bankruptcy in 1971 and was acquired by Kadokawa Pictures.

<i>Something Like an Autobiography</i> book by Akira Kurosawa

Something Like an Autobiography is the memoir of Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa. It was published as a book in 1981 and the English translation by Audie E. Bock appeared the following year.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Sharp, Jasper (2011). Historical Dictionary of Japanese Cinema. Bowman & Littlefield. ISBN   0-8108-7541-1. pages 125–128
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Fu, Poshek (2003). Between Shanghai and Hong Kong: The Politics of Chinese Cinemas. Stanford University Press. ISBN   0-8047-4518-8. pages 95–98
  3. ↑ Baskett, Michael (2008). The Attractive Empire: Transnational Film Culture in Imperial Japan. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN   978-0-8248-3163-9. page 121
  4. ↑ Hu, Tze-Yu (2013). Japanese Animation: East Asian Perspectives. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN   978-1-61703-809-9. page 42
  5. ↑ Baxter, John (1998). Von Sternberg. University of Kentucky Press. ISBN   0-8131-2601-0. pages 251–253
  6. ↑ "Kawakita Memorial Film Institute home page" (in Japanese). Kawakita Memorial Film Institute. Retrieved February 10, 2015.


This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.