Imai Tadashi grew up the son a priest in the Shibuya district of Tokyo. While attending Tokyo Imperial University, he joined a communist youth league and was arrested a handful of times for “radical” activities. In 1935, Tadashi dropped out of school and joined J.O. Studio as an assistant director. Four years later, at age 27, he directed his his first film, Numazu Military Academy. Regarding his quick immersion into film, Donald Richie states, “Unlike other directors of his generation, notably Kinoshita and Kurosawa, who underwent long apprenticeships under directors Shimazu Yasujiro and Yamamoto Kajiro, respectively, Imai entered the cinema untrained. This does not mean that his point of view is amateurish or awkward, but it explains his stylistic diffusion or, another way of looking at it, his freedom from limitations.”
During WWII, Tadashi was forced to direct pro-war propaganda films for the studio. However, his first film following the war, Minshu no Teki (An Enemy of the… read more
Imai Tadashi grew up the son a priest in the Shibuya district of Tokyo. While attending Tokyo Imperial University, he joined a communist youth league and was arrested a handful of times for “radical” activities. In 1935, Tadashi dropped out of school and joined J.O. Studio as an assistant director. Four years later, at age 27, he directed his his first film, Numazu Military Academy. Regarding his quick immersion into film, Donald Richie states, “Unlike other directors of his generation, notably Kinoshita and Kurosawa, who underwent long apprenticeships under directors Shimazu Yasujiro and Yamamoto Kajiro, respectively, Imai entered the cinema untrained. This does not mean that his point of view is amateurish or awkward, but it explains his stylistic diffusion or, another way of looking at it, his freedom from limitations.”
During WWII, Tadashi was forced to direct pro-war propaganda films for the studio. However, his first film following the war, Minshu no Teki (An Enemy of the People), took a pro-Communist stance and attacked the rulers of Japan. As Donald Richie points out, Tadashi’s film passed the US censorship boards “because it was anti-Zaibatsu and heaped scorn and ridicule on the emperor system.” The film did not go unnoticed to Japanese critics, as they awarded him Best Director at the Mainichi Film Concours.
In 1951, Tadashi helped usher-in the postwar independent film movement with Dokkoi ikiteiru (Still We Live). It is credited with being the first independently produced Japanese feature film made outside of the studio.
Over the next ten years, Tadashi became influenced by Italian neo-realism and focused his attention to several films that dealt with social injustice. Himeyuri no to (The Tower of Lilies) and Nigorie (Muddy Waters) were released in 1953 and both films deal with the oppression of women in Japanese society. Three years later, he made Mahiru no ankoku (Darkness at Noon), a film about four young men who were arrested, beaten, and coerced into confessing to a crime they did not commit; the film was based on a similar trial that was occurring simultaneously in Japan at the time. By the end of the decade, Tadashi’s films had amassed over 30 nominations from various Japanese and international festivals.
When Bushido premiered in 1963, it was his 33rd film. After it won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 1963, it would be 39 years until another Japanese film was awarded with the prize (Hiyao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away in 2002).
His last film, War and Youth, was released less than one month after his death in 1991. Although Tadashi was not nominated for his direction, the film garnered nine Japanese Academy nominations (winning two); at the Montreal World Film Festival, Tadashi was awarded the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury.
In addition to the Golden Bear, Tadashi won Best Director at the 1958 Berlin Film Festival for Junai monogatari (The Story of Pure Love). Two of his films were nominated at the Cannes Film Festival: 1953’s Nigorie (An Inlet of Muddy Water) and 1957’s Kome (The Rice People).
Over a career in film that lasted over 50 years, Tadashi directed almost 50 films. Having never received a nomination from the Japanese Academy during his lifetime, he was awarded a posthumous Lifetime Achievement Award in 1992. —AnimEigo
