13 Facts About Masahiko Amakasu

Masahiko Amakasu was an officer in the Imperial Japanese Army who was imprisoned for his involvement in the Amakasu Incident, the extrajudicial execution of anarchists after the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake.

Masahiko Amakasu later became head of the Manchukuo Film Association.

Masahiko Amakasu was educated in military boarding schools in Mie Prefecture and Nagoya, and entered the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in 1912.

On September 16,1923, when Masahiko Amakasu was a lieutenant in charge of a detachment of the Kenpeitai military police during the chaos immediately following the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake of September 1, he and his officers arrested the well-known anarchists Sakae Osugi and Noe Ito, along with Sakae's six-year-old nephew, Munekazu Tachibana.

Masahiko Amakasu was sentenced to ten years in prison with hard labour, and IJA sergeant Keijiro Mori was sentenced to three years in prison with hard labour as an accomplice.

Masahiko Amakasu returned to Japan in 1930, but almost immediately relocated to Mukden in Manchuria, where he worked under Japanese spymaster Kenji Doihara to manage the Japanese Army's increasing involvement in opium production and smuggling into China.

When Puyi landed in Port Arthur in November 1931, it was Masahiko Amakasu who greeted him at the dock and escorted him to the train that took him to the Yamato Hotel.

In Manchukuo, Masahiko Amakasu helped establish the civilian police force in the new capital of Xinjing, as the city of Changchun had been renamed.

In 1934, at Puyi's coronation as Emperor of Manchukuo, Masahiko Amakasu again played the role of Puyi's minder under the guise of serving as the director of the film crew that recorded the coronation.

Masahiko Amakasu strove hard to improve the quality of the works produced, traveling to Germany to acquire the latest movie cameras and production techniques, and inviting noted Japanese movie stars, directors and conductors to visit Manchukuo and to participate in his productions.

Masahiko Amakasu's efforts were instrumental in launching the career of Yoshiko Otaka, better known as "Ri Koran" in Japanese.

In 1940, Masahiko Amakasu produced, which became the most popular Japanese film of that year.

However, Hotta observed that Masahiko Amakasu did project a Pan-Asian message in the film, with its Chinese heroine marrying the Japanese hero, and moreover, it is clear that the Japanese hero is the dominant partner in their relationship, which was meant as a metaphor for the relationship Masahiko Amakasu wanted to see between Japan and China.