Kon Ichikawa

He gained his western credibility in the 1950s and 1960s with a number of bleak films - two antiwar films with The Burmese Harp and Fires on the Plain, Conflagration in which a priest burns down his temple to save it from spiritual pollution, Alone in the Pacific and the technically formidable An Actor's Revenge about a Kabuki actor. Most of these films are literary adaptations, often screen-written by his wife, Natto Wada, and when she ceased this activity at the end of the 1960s it marked a change in his films.

It can be said that his main trait is technical expertise, irony, detachment and a drive for realism married with a complete spectrum of genres. Some critics class him with Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi[?] and Yasujiro Ozu as one of the masters of Japanese cinema.

Filmography

• Hana Hiraku[?] (1948)
• Sanbyaku Rokujugo-ya[?] (1948)
• Ningen Moyo[?] (1949)
• Hateshinaki Jonetsu[?] (1949)
• Ginza Sanshiro[?] (1950),
• Akatsuki no Tsuiseki[?] (1950),
• Ye-Rai-Shang[?] (1951),
• Koibito[?] (1951),
• Mukokuseki-Mono[?] (1951),
• Nusumareta Koi[?] (1951),
• Bungawan Solo[?] (1951),
• Kekkon Koshin-kyoku[?] (1951),
• Lucky San[?] (1952), Wakai Hito]] (1952),
• Ashi ni Sawatta Onna[?] (1952),
• Ano te Kono te[?] (1952),
• Pusan[?] (1953),
• Aoiro Kakumei[?] (1953),
• Seishun Zenigata Heiji[?] (1953),
• Aijin[?] (1953),
• Watashi no Subete O[?] (1954),
• A Billionaire[?] (1954),
• Seishun Kaidan[?] (1955),
• The Heart[?] (1955),
• The Burmese Harp[?] (1956),
• Punishment Room[?] (1956),
• Nihonbashi[?] (1956),
• Manin Densha[?] (1957),
• The Men of Tohoku[?] (1957),
• Conflagration[?] (1958),
• Sayonara Konnichiwa[?] (1959),
• The Key[?] (1959),
• Fires on the Plain[?] (1959),
• Keisatsukan to Boroyuku-dan[?] (1959),
• Ginza no Mosa[?] (1960),
• Bonchi[?] (1960),
• Jokyo[?] (1960),
• Her Brother[?] (1960),
• Kuroi Junin no Onna[?] (1961),
• The Sin[?] (1962),
• Being Two Isn't Easy[?] (1962),
• An Actor's Revenge[?] (1963),
• Alone in the Pacific[?] (1963),
• Dokonji Monogatari[?] (1964),
• Tokyo Olympiad[?] (documentary) (1965),
• Top Gigio e i sei Ladri[?] (1968),
• Tournament[?] (1968),
• Ai Futatabi[?] (1971),
• The Wanderers[?] (1973),
• Wagahai wa Neko Dearu[?] (1975),
• Akuma no Temari-uta[?] (1977),
• Inugamike no Ichizoku[?] (1977),
• Gokumon-to[?] (1978),
• Hi no Tori[?] (1978),
• Joh-on Bachi[?] (1978),
• Hi no Tori[?] (1980),
• Kofuku[?] (1982),
• Sasame Yuki[?] (1983),
• Biruma no Tategoto[?] (1983),
• Ohan[?] (1983),
• Rokumeikan[?] (1986),
• Eiga Joyu[?] (1987),
• Taketori Mongatari[?] (1987),
• Tsuru[?] (1988),
• Tenkawa densetsu satsujin jiken[?] (1991),
• Fusa (1993),
• Shijushichinin no shikaku[?] (1994),
• Yatsuhaka-mura[?] (1996),
• Dora-heita[?] (1999)