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Japanese film director From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Yasujirō Shimazu (島津 保次郎, Shimazu Yasujirō, 3 June 1897 – 18 September 1945) was a Japanese film director and screenwriter, and a pioneer of the shōshimin-eiga (common people drama) genre at the Shōchiku studios in pre-World War II Japan.[1]
Shimazu was born in Tokyo,[lower-alpha 1] the second son of merchant Otojirō Shimazu. His father owned a long-established seaweed business named Kōshū-ya directly in front of the main Mitsukoshi department store in Nihonbashi.[4]
Shimazu entered Shōchiku in 1920 after answering an advertisement and began training under Kaoru Osanai.[3] He gave his debut as director in 1921 at Shōchiku's recently established Kamata studio,[3] directing both comedy and melodrama films, often depicting the everyday life of the lower middle classes.[1] Our Neighbor, Miss Yae (1934) and A Brother and His Younger Sister (1939) are regarded as his most exemplary and best films.[1][5] By the end of the 1930s, he moved to Tōhō studios, where he made some films in cooperation with the Manchuria Film Association.[6] He died of cancer just after the war ended.[2] Many famous directors, such as Heinosuke Gosho, Shirō Toyoda, Kōzaburō Yoshimura, and Keisuke Kinoshita, started their careers as his assistant.[1]
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