Ten Best Japanese Directors

[Li Hoo Cheong]

Recently I re-read the results of 3 ranking surveys on Japanese
directors conducted by "Kinema Junpo" back in 1995 and 2000.  The first
was published in issue 1176 (Nov 1995) polling the opinions of mainly
film critics.  The later two were published in issue 1320 (Nov 2000),
one from 104 well known people (A) and one from 1502 ordinary readers
(B). Here are the 3 lists down to the best 20 directors:

1995                       2000 (A)               2000 (B)

1  Ozu                       1  Kurosawa            1  Kurosawa
2  Kurosawa                  2  Ozu                 2  Ozu
3  Mizoguchi                 3  Mizoguchi           3  Kinoshita
4  Oshima                    4  Kinoshita           4  Yamada
   Naruse                    5  Naruse              5  Mizoguchi
6  Ichikawa Kon              6  Yamada              6  Ichikawa
7  Kawashima Yuzo            7  Ichikawa            7  Naruse
8  Uchida Tomu                  Uchida              8  Kitano
9  Yamanaka Sadao               Oshima              9  Imai
   Kinoshita Keishuke           Fukasaku            10 Imamura
   Okamoto Kihachi              Kawashima           11 Obayashi Nobuhiko

   Suzuki Seijun             12 Shindo Kaneto          Miyazaki
13 Fukasaku Kinji               Makino Masahiro     13 Uchida
   Kumashiro Tatsumi         14 Imamura Shohei         Oshima
15 Kato Tai                     Okamoto             15 Fukasaku
   Masumura Yasuzo              Kitano Takeshi         Yamanaka
   Yamada Yoji                  Suzuki              17 Kawashima
   Ito Daisuke                  Masumura               Masumura
19 Imai Tadashi              19 Miyazaki Hayao      19 Kumashiro
   Somai Shinji              20 Morita Yoshimitsu      Kobayashi Masaki
                                Yamanaka Sadao

I guess if a survey were conducted today, Kitano and Miyazaki would have
gained more support.  However, my personal list of the best ten would be
something like this:

1  Mizoguchi, Ozu, Kurosawa

4  Naruse, Kinoshita

6  Ichikawa, Imamura

And contenders for the 8-10 places would include Uchida, Shindo,
Kobayashi, Yamada, and Oshima.  I have seen enough of Yamada and Oshima
to make a decision, but have to view more films by Uchida, Shindo and
Kobayashi (whose Kaseki I recently saw and John Simon wrote a wonderful
review on it when it was shown in US) to be more conclusive.  Miyazaki
is not considered because he directed only animation while Yamanaka has
too few surviving films for serious consideration as a top-ten director.

In my memory, this topic has not yet been discussed by list-members.
Shall we begin?

H C Li
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