Masahiro Shinoda

In this video appreciation, created in 2009, we present filmmaker Masahiro Shinoda’s observations on THE HUMAN CONDITION and director Masaki Kobayashi.

A young tofu maker, Eikichi comes from Kyoto to open a tofu shop in a friendly neighborhood. He meets there a feisty local girl Ofumi who befriends him as he sets up his shop, Kyo-ya and in spite of the difficulties stemming from cultural differences between the two ancient capitals including the favored taste of tofu itself, they eventually marry and become the owner of a tofu shop on a more respectable street. Behind the rock-solid business of Kyo-ya, their son, Eitaro bears the brunt of other tofu shops' animosity toward Kyo-ya's refusal to comply with Edo's way of running business and starts to frequent a gambling hall run by the mysterious "Boss", which throws the family into a critical situation that threaten to pull them apart...

A foreign spy using the Sorge alias is assigned to Tokyo the capital of Japan just prior to the outbreak of World War II and in the midst of the Japanese imperial ambitions in Eastern Asia. The spy becomes acquainted with a sympathetic communist who like he is attached to the ideals of freedom and rule of the masses. Sorge is able to feed the Soviet Union useful information regarding the Axis allies and their movements in Asia and beyond.

A foreign spy using the Sorge alias is assigned to Tokyo the capital of Japan just prior to the outbreak of World War II and in the midst of the Japanese imperial ambitions in Eastern Asia. The spy becomes acquainted with a sympathetic communist who like he is attached to the ideals of freedom and rule of the masses. Sorge is able to feed the Soviet Union useful information regarding the Axis allies and their movements in Asia and beyond.

天正9年、織田信長率いる軍勢によって伊賀の全土は焼き払われ、大勢が虐殺される運命に。それから10年後、辛うじて生き残り、山奥で隠遁生活を送っていた伊賀忍者のひとり、葛籠重蔵は、堺の豪商・今井宗久から密命を受け、織田亡き後に時の権力者となった豊臣秀吉の暗殺計画に乗り出す。それを阻止すべく彼の前に立ちはだかったのは、かつては仲間だったが今や伊賀ではなくなり、武士として出世を望む風間五平だったが……？

天正9年、織田信長率いる軍勢によって伊賀の全土は焼き払われ、大勢が虐殺される運命に。それから10年後、辛うじて生き残り、山奥で隠遁生活を送っていた伊賀忍者のひとり、葛籠重蔵は、堺の豪商・今井宗久から密命を受け、織田亡き後に時の権力者となった豊臣秀吉の暗殺計画に乗り出す。それを阻止すべく彼の前に立ちはだかったのは、かつては仲間だったが今や伊賀ではなくなり、武士として出世を望む風間五平だったが……？

After the 1995 Kobe earthquake, a writer remembers travelling with his family to bury his brother after World War II.

寛政時代の江戸。老中・松平定信は町人文化の隆盛に危機感を抱き、厳しい弾圧を加え始めていた。そんな中、役者絵の第一人者・歌麿は、定信が江戸出版界の大物・蔦屋重三郎を標的にしていることに気付き、早々と蔦屋のもとから他の版元にくら替えしてしまう。売れっ子の歌麿に逃げられた蔦屋は彼に代わる絵師を探し始め、やがてけがで引退を余儀なくされた元役者のとんぼこと十郎兵衛に、荒削りながら斬新な才能を見いだすが…。

寛政時代の江戸。老中・松平定信は町人文化の隆盛に危機感を抱き、厳しい弾圧を加え始めていた。そんな中、役者絵の第一人者・歌麿は、定信が江戸出版界の大物・蔦屋重三郎を標的にしていることに気付き、早々と蔦屋のもとから他の版元にくら替えしてしまう。売れっ子の歌麿に逃げられた蔦屋は彼に代わる絵師を探し始め、やがてけがで引退を余儀なくされた元役者のとんぼこと十郎兵衛に、荒削りながら斬新な才能を見いだすが…。

寛政時代の江戸。老中・松平定信は町人文化の隆盛に危機感を抱き、厳しい弾圧を加え始めていた。そんな中、役者絵の第一人者・歌麿は、定信が江戸出版界の大物・蔦屋重三郎を標的にしていることに気付き、早々と蔦屋のもとから他の版元にくら替えしてしまう。売れっ子の歌麿に逃げられた蔦屋は彼に代わる絵師を探し始め、やがてけがで引退を余儀なくされた元役者のとんぼこと十郎兵衛に、荒削りながら斬新な才能を見いだすが…。

In this 1993 video interview, filmed for the Directors Guild of Japan at Tokyo’s Haiyuza Theatre, director Masaki Kobayashi talks to fellow filmmaker and longtime Kobayashi admirer Masahiro Shinoda (DOUBLE SUICIDE) about THE HUMAN CONDITION.

戦時下の昭和19年に富山に疎開した東京の少年と地元の少年の友情と葛藤を描いたドラマ。柏原兵三の小説を藤子不二雄Aが漫画化、これを篠田正浩監督が映画化した。昭和19年10月、戦局が悪化の一途を辿る中、東京の小学5年生だった風間進二は、富山に縁故疎開することになった。ひ弱な優等生タイプの進二は学校ではよそ者扱いを受ける。そんな進二にガキ大将の武が近づいてきた。徐々に打ち解ける二人だったが、権力を誇示する武は学校では進二に冷たく接するのだった……。

Based on a semi-autobiographical story by Ogai Mori, about a Japanese medical student who goes to Berlin to study in the 1880s and falls in love with a German ballet dancer.

Based on a semi-autobiographical story by Ogai Mori, about a Japanese medical student who goes to Berlin to study in the 1880s and falls in love with a German ballet dancer.

The tragic story of Gonza, a handsome ladies man, set in the Tokagawa Period, a time in which appearences are very important. Gonza competes with Bannojo for the honor to perform the tea ceremony to celebrate the birth of an heir to the lord of their clan. To see the sacred tea scrolls Gonza promises to marry the daughter of the family which possesses them, even though he is unofficially engaged to another. When studying the scrolls with Osai, the mother of the house, Bannajo sneaks into the house and steals their obis and runs through the town proclaiming the two as adulterers.

Musical film: Hiromi Go plays a warrior, a gigolo, and an officer spread across a thousand years of history

昭和20年9月。淡路島の国民学校。敗戦によって、この学校でも軍国教育から民主主義教育に変わり、子どもたちにも少なからず戸惑いが生じる。5年男組の担任の駒子先生は新婚直後に夫・正夫が戦死、嫁ぎ先の家に留まるべきか悩んでいた。

瀬戸内海のある島を舞台に起る、連続殺人事件を追う金田一耕肋の活躍を描く。横溝正史の同名の小説の映画化で、脚本は「幸福号出帆」の清水邦夫、監督は「夜叉ヶ池」の篠田正浩、撮影も同作の宮川一夫がそれぞれ担当。

Outside of a small village in Japan, a mysterious pond is inhabited by mythic creatures. Their story is of revenge, tragedy, and the power of real love. A classical tale which translates wonderfully to film.

A blind traveling musician is abused and oppressed wherever she goes, even as the modern world imposes change around her.

A blind traveling musician is abused and oppressed wherever she goes, even as the modern world imposes change around her.

A mountain man beheads his many wives to prove his love to an alluring woman he meets in an enchanted forest.

A mountain man beheads his many wives to prove his love to an alluring woman he meets in an enchanted forest.

A freestyle, imagined telling of the life of shaman queen Himiko, who falls in love with her half-brother, making her powers weaken thus putting her position to risk.

A freestyle, imagined telling of the life of shaman queen Himiko, who falls in love with her half-brother, making her powers weaken thus putting her position to risk.

A freestyle, imagined telling of the life of shaman queen Himiko, who falls in love with her half-brother, making her powers weaken thus putting her position to risk.

緋本治夫25歳。大都会のある大学病院で病理学を専攻しているインターンである。病院では、塩見菊江の一人息子、和彦の脳手術を、宮地教授が行おうとしていた。治夫は、この医学の権威を背負っているような尊大な宮地に対して憤りを覚えていた。ある日、治夫は高校で同級だった井沢英子と再会した。英子は都心の地下街にある高級理髪店でマニキュア・ガールをしている。治夫はその店のマスターが英子と関係があるのを感じ、英子をマスターから奪う決心をした…

A documentary about the 1972 Winter Olympic Games in Sapporo, Japan.

17世紀の長崎。キリシタン弾圧が激化する中、2人のポルトガル人宣教師が秘かに来日する。 20年前に渡来した恩師の行方を捜すためである。 キチジローに案内され隠れキリシタンの村にかくまわれるが、金のため役人に密告されてしまう…。

17世紀の長崎。キリシタン弾圧が激化する中、2人のポルトガル人宣教師が秘かに来日する。 20年前に渡来した恩師の行方を捜すためである。 キチジローに案内され隠れキリシタンの村にかくまわれるが、金のため役人に密告されてしまう…。

17世紀の長崎。キリシタン弾圧が激化する中、2人のポルトガル人宣教師が秘かに来日する。 20年前に渡来した恩師の行方を捜すためである。 キチジローに案内され隠れキリシタンの村にかくまわれるが、金のため役人に密告されてしまう…。

An outlaw pushes the residents of Edo's red light district to rebel against a growing number of stifling, moralistic laws.

An electrifying journey into the nether regions of the late-‘60s Tokyo underground. A loose adaptation of Oedipus Rex in which a gay son kills his mother and sleeps with his father.

Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.

Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.

Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.

A Japanese soldier deserts his position and travels to a small town on the Sea of Japan to start over. When a young maid falls for him, he talks her into sleeping with an older man for money.

Seeking revenge against the guard who tormented him, a young man returns to the island where he was imprisoned in reform school. But his plans for vengeance are disturbed when he encounters a strange and beautiful young woman

Seeking revenge against the guard who tormented him, a young man returns to the island where he was imprisoned in reform school. But his plans for vengeance are disturbed when he encounters a strange and beautiful young woman

Years of warfare end in a Japan unified under the Tokugawa shogunate, and samurai spy Sasuke Sarutobi, tired of conflict, longs for peace. When a high-ranking spy named Tatewaki Koriyama defects from the shogun to a rival clan, however, the world of swordsmen is thrown into turmoil. After Sasuke is unwittingly drawn into the conflict, he tracks Tatewaki, while a mysterious, white-hooded figure seems to hunt them both. By tale’s end, no one is who they seemed to be, and the truth is far more personal than anyone suspected. Director Masahiro Shinoda’s Samurai Spy, filled with clan intrigue, ninja spies, and multiple double crosses, marks a bold stylistic departure from swordplay film convention.

When the man who seduced the famous painter Otoko as a teenager--and then wrote a bestselling novel about it--reappears in her life, her pupil--and lesbian lover--hatches a plot to destroy the man and his family.

Assassination begins with the events of 1853 when "four black ships" anchored at Edo Bay, sparking civil unrest and the major political manoeuvring that saw the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate. At a time when assassination had become a disturbing political tool, Shinoda's film follows Hachiro Kiyokawa, an ambitious, masterless samurai whose allegiances drift dangerously between the Shogunate and the Emperor.

刑務所を出所した村木は、賭場で少女と出会う。ある夜、彼は屋台でその少女と再会した。彼女の名は冴子。冴子はもっと大きな勝負があるところへ連れて行ってほしいとせがんだ。二人は大きな賭場へ行くが、村木はそこで、葉という男を見つけた。殺しと麻薬だけに生きているという葉は、賭けをしている冴子のことを見つめていた。

刑務所を出所した村木は、賭場で少女と出会う。ある夜、彼は屋台でその少女と再会した。彼女の名は冴子。冴子はもっと大きな勝負があるところへ連れて行ってほしいとせがんだ。二人は大きな賭場へ行くが、村木はそこで、葉という男を見つけた。殺しと麻薬だけに生きているという葉は、賭けをしている冴子のことを見つめていた。

Takashi Fujiki stars as a rebel in this drama about life on the Yokohama waterfront by New Wave director Masahiro Shinoda. The rebel works as an errand boy for a shipping company and vents his frustrations by plucking on the guitar. His interpretations of popular trends in music are sometimes right-on, and sometimes not exactly. Bereft of his guitar, the rebel's modes of expression are not as effective in generating interest as the Yokohama docks themselves, a fascinating world in their own right.

Takashi Fujiki stars as a rebel in this drama about life on the Yokohama waterfront by New Wave director Masahiro Shinoda. The rebel works as an errand boy for a shipping company and vents his frustrations by plucking on the guitar. His interpretations of popular trends in music are sometimes right-on, and sometimes not exactly. Bereft of his guitar, the rebel's modes of expression are not as effective in generating interest as the Yokohama docks themselves, a fascinating world in their own right.

A treasury official passed over for promotion and obsessed with careerism interferes in the lives of his three sons, who seek escape from his relentless pressure in the mortal danger of mountain climbing.

When two sisters fall in love with the same man, one must decide to look elsewhere.

When two sisters fall in love with the same man, one must decide to look elsewhere.

A woman brings her injured daughter to the hospital, only to realize that the doctor is the estranged father of her child.

Ishihara Kiyoshi plans to marry the woman he loves, Chiee, a coffee shop girl. After an accident, Chiee loses her memory. A romance movie whose original work by Ayako Sono was made into a melodrama by a combination of Shinoda Masahiro and Terayama Shuji.

Ishihara Kiyoshi plans to marry the woman he loves, Chiee, a coffee shop girl. After an accident, Chiee loses her memory. A romance movie whose original work by Ayako Sono was made into a melodrama by a combination of Shinoda Masahiro and Terayama Shuji.

Eye-popping visuals and black humor mark this wild New Wave masterpiece about a vengeful contractor who hires a series of young killers to target a woman muckraker. Trouble brews when an amateur marksman shows up his eclectic competition.

A reckless student contemplates terrorism in a prescient film that confirmed Shinoda as a fearless member of Shochiku’s iconoclastic New Wave. At the height of student protests, Shimojo (Shinichiro Mikami) takes his aggressions to another level, beset by seemingly insoluble feelings of alienation.

The backstage romances of an egotistical singer and his under-valued manager, a lovelorn bandman and a nude dancer.

The backstage romances of an egotistical singer and his under-valued manager, a lovelorn bandman and a nude dancer.

親子愛の断層に焦点を当てた巨匠・小津安二郎の異色作――― 杉山周吉は、20年前、妻にその愛人と逃げられ、長女を嫁がせた今、次女・明子とひっそりと暮らしている。だが、最近明子の帰宅が遅れがちなことに気をもんでいた。明子は年下の恋人の子を妊娠、それを知って姿を消してしまった彼を毎晩探しさまよっていたのだ。そんなある日、ふとしたことから明子は自分や父を捨てた実母と再会。何も知らなかった明子は、母のみだ…