Sadao Yamanaka was a Japanese film director and screenwriter who directed 26 films between
1932 and 1938. He was a contemporary of Yasujirō Ozu, Mikio Naruse and Kenji Mizoguchi and
one of the primary figures in the development of the jidaigeki, or historical film. Yamanaka
died of dysentary in Manchuria after being drafted into the Imperial Japanese Army. He
is the uncle of the Japanese film director Tai Kato, who once penned a book about Yamanaka,
Eiga kantoku Yamanaka Sadao. Only three of his films survive in nearly
complete form. While long considered a master filmmaker in his native Japan, interest in
Yamanaka's work redeveloped after the restoration and Japanese DVD release of the three surviving
films. His most internationally discussed film, Humanity and Paper Balloons, was given
its first non-Japanese DVD release in the UK as a Masters of Cinema release.
Career Yamanaka began his career in the Japanese
film industry at the age of 20 as a writer and assistant director for the Makino company.
In 1932, he began working for Kanjuro Productions, a small, independent film company similar
to many others founded during the same period as it was centered around a popular jidaigeki
film star, this time Kanjuro Arashi. Here, he began directing his first films, all of
which were jidaigeki. During his first year at Kanjuro, he made six films. He was "discovered"
by the critic Matsuo Kishi and gained a reputation for creating films that escaped clichés and
focused on social injustices. He formed the Narutaki-gumi with his friends, and they wrote
under the pseudonym Kimpachi Kajiwara. During the 1930s he moved between several
film companies, eventually settling in Kyoto and working for the Nikkatsu Company. Most
of his films were silent films as sound did not gain a prominence in Japan until 1935-36.
He worked twice with the Japanese theatre troupe Zenshin-za: first on The Village Tattooed
Man and on his final film, Humanity and Paper Balloons.
Humanity and Paper Balloons premiered the same day that Yamanaka was drafted into the
Japanese army. He later died in a field hospital in the then-Japanese ruled Manchukuo, known
today as Manchuria. The cause of death was inflammation of the intestines.
Style and influences Early on, Yamanaka had stated an interest
in blurring the lines between several genres: comedy, historical epics, and comedy-dramas
focusing on average people. Viewers and critics note in his surviving films the genesis of
ideas later explored by the internationally successful Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi,
Yasujirō Ozu and Seijun Suzuki. Yamanaka has been characterized as a minimalist,
one whose style favoured elegance and rhythm. In fact, he was a close friend of Ozu, who
is often noted as a minimalist too. Yamanaka is said to have been inspired by
Hollywood films such as Rouben Mamoulian's City Streets, Edmund Goulding's Grand Hotel
and Frank Capra's It Happened One Night. Director Kazuo Kuroki once said of Yamanaka,
"Every film he made wonderfully depicted human purity and chastity with a tender, delicate
gaze. I was astonished that a young man in his twenties accomplished such perfection."
Partial filmography The Million Ryo Pot - also known as Tange
Sazen Yowa: Hyakuman Ryo no Tsubo Kōchiyama Sōshun
Humanity and Paper Balloons - also known as Ninjo Kamifusen
References
Richie, Donald. A Hundred Years of Japanese Film: A Concise History, with a Selective
Guide to Videos and DVDs. New York: Kodansha America. ISBN 4-7700-2995-0.
Sato, Tadao. Currents in Japanese Cinema: Essays. New York: Kodansha America. ISBN 0-87011-815-3.
External links Sadao Yamanaka at the Internet Movie Database
Sadao Yamanaka at the Japanese Movie Database