Kyoichi Yamaoka

Birth : 1940-07-15, Uryū, Hokkaido Prefecture, Japan

Death : 1986-01-13

History

Born in 1940 in Uryū, Hokkaido Prefecture, Japan to a coal-mining family. In 1968, he left for Tokyo, and became familiar with the neighborhood of Sanya. In 1972, he formed a committee aimed at fighting crime there. In 1982, he assisted with the establishment of the National Conference of Day Laborers’ Unions. After the murder of Mitsuo Sato and according to his wishes, Yamaoka began working to complete the film Yama – Attack to Attack. On 13 January 1986, he was shot to death on a street in Shinjuku Ward, Tokyo, by a member of the ultra-nationalist Konryu gang. He was 45 years old.

Movies

Yama – Attack to Attack
Yama – Attack to Attack
Director
This extraordinary documentary is an unflinching record of the workers’ struggle during Japan’s economic rebirth in the 1980s, centered on Tokyo’s Sanya “yoseba”—a slum community dating from the 19th century where day laborers lived in terrible conditions while they sought work.