15 Facts About Kinuyo Tanaka

Kinuyo Tanaka was a Japanese actress and film director.

Kinuyo Tanaka had a career lasting over 50 years with more than 250 acting credits, but was best known for her 15 films with director Kenji Mizoguchi, such as The Life of Oharu and Ugetsu.

Kinuyo Tanaka was born in Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture, the youngest of nine children of Kumekichi and Yasu Kinuyo Tanaka.

Kinuyo Tanaka learned playing the biwa at an early age and moved to Osaka in 1920, where she joined the Biwa Girls' Operetta Troupe.

Kinuyo Tanaka lived with director Hiroshi Shimizu from 1927 to 1929 after appearing in a number of his films; although they separated in 1929, she starred in some of his later films.

Kinuyo Tanaka remained unmarried for her entire life and had no children.

Kinuyo Tanaka became a leading actress at an early age, appearing in Yasujiro Ozu's I Graduated, But.

On her return, Kinuyo Tanaka displayed an inheritance of cultural mannerisms from America which many of her fans found distasteful.

Kinuyo Tanaka resigned from Shochiku and announced her intention of going freelance, which would give her more scope to choose which directors she wished to work with.

Kinuyo Tanaka subsequently worked on films with Mikio Naruse, Ozu, Kinoshita, Gosho and others.

Kinuyo Tanaka had a close working relationship with director Kenji Mizoguchi, having parts in 15 of his films, including leading roles in The Life of Oharu, Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff.

Kinuyo Tanaka was the second Japanese woman who worked as a film director, after Tazuko Sakane.

Kinuyo Tanaka directed five more films between 1953 and 1962, focusing on the subject of femininity; while her films received less attention from contemporary commentators and Tanaka herself downplayed them, interest in them has been revived in recent years for their unique and pioneering portrayals of Japanese women.

One of Kinuyo Tanaka's most acknowledged films, The Eternal Breasts, follows the biography of the late tanka poet Fumiko Nakajo.

In 2021, all six of the films Kinuyo Tanaka directed were screened theatrically in digitally remastered versions at the Cannes Film Festival and the Lyon Film Festival.