Kon Ichikawa (市川 崑) (born
November 20,
1915,
Mie[?] Prefecture,
Japan) is one of the better known Japanese
film directors and one of the most unpredictable.
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.
- 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)