更新日：2010年7月5日

Ozu Yasujiro

The movie director and screenplay writer Ozu Yasujiro was born in Tokyo in 1903. After watching the Hollywood film, Civilization, he realized he was destined to be a moviemaker.

In 1923, he began working as an assistant cameraman at the Kamata studios of the Shochiku Kinema Company. After a stint as an assistant director, he directed his first movie, Zange no Yaeba (Sword of Penitence), a costume piece, in 1927. The Kinema Junpo magazine ranked his 1932 work Umarete wa mita keredo (I Was Born, but . . .) top of its best ten movies listing. During World War II, he was commandeered to make documentaries and went with the Japanese forces to the South Pacific war zones.

After the war, he made his comeback with Nagaya Shinshiroku (The Record of a Tenement Gentleman) in 1947. He then began a partnership with the scriptwriter Noda Kogo to make masterpieces such as Banshun (Late Spring), Bakushu (Early Summer), and Ochazuke no Aji (Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice).

With his effective use of low camera placement, he earned worldwide recognition as a master moviemaker and won the Sutherland Trophy at the 1958 London Film Festival for Tokyo Monogatari (Tokyo Story). In February 1963, Daikon to Ninjin (Radishes and Carrots) was chosen as the title for his next movie, but in December of that year he died on his 60th birthday.

Ozu lived near Jochiji temple in Kita-Kamakura from 1952 till his death and became a close friend of the Kamakura literati including Satomi Ton and Osaragi Jiro. His ashes are buried at Engakuji temple.