Kazuo Miyagawa: Cinematographer and Visual Stylist

October 23–November 28, 2021

One of film’s most talented cinematographers, Kazuo Miyagawa worked with many of the great Japanese directors, including Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi, Yasujiro Ozu, Kon Ichikawa, and Masahiro Shinoda, all represented in this series, which foregrounds his artistry on the big screen.

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  • Rashomon

  • Ugetsu

  • Sansho the Bailiff

  • Floating Weeds

  • A Story from Chikamatsu

  • Yojimbo

  • Tokyo Olympiad

  • Upcoming
    Films
  • Upcoming
    Events
  • Selected
    Objects
  • Past
    Films
  • Past
    Events

Past Films

  • Rashomon

    Akira Kurosawa
    Japan, 1950

    Digital Restoration

    Saturday, October 23 5 PM

    Visual proof of the relativity of truth, Rashomon is “one of the most brilliantly constructed films of all time, a monument to Kurosawa’s greatness, and a landmark in film history” (James Monaco).

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  • Ugetsu

    Kenji Mizoguchi
    Japan, 1953

    BAMPFA Collection

    Thursday, October 28 7 PM

    Consistently named one of the best films ever made, Kenji Mizoguchi’s ethereal fable is set in sixteenth-century Japan, where a potter has his head turned by a phantom enchantress, with predictable results.

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  • Sansho the Bailiff

    Kenji Mizoguchi
    Japan, 1954

    BAMPFA Collection

    Saturday, October 30 7 PM

    Bring all your senses and your handkerchief to this haunting tale of a family victimized by the cruel practices of feudal Japan, “developed with intuition, cunning, and an overarching sense of tragedy” (SF Weekly).

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  • Floating Weeds

    Yasujiro Ozu
    Japan, 1959

    Digital Restoration

    Sunday, November 7 4:30 PM

    Glorious color photography brings new intensity to Yasujiro Ozu’s 1934 story about a traveling actor encountering his illegitimate son, revealing “deep nostalgia for the dying folk culture of old Japan” (Hong Kong Film Festival).

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  • A Story from Chikamatsu

    Kenji Mizoguchi
    Japan, 1954

    Digital Restoration

    Friday, November 19 7 PM

    Shot in a gorgeous, painterly style by Kazuo Miyagawa, this subtly sensuous indictment of societal oppression was heralded by Akira Kurosawa as a “great masterpiece that could only have been made by Mizoguchi.”

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  • Yojimbo

    Akira Kurosawa
    Japan, 1961

    35mm Scope Print

    Friday, November 26 7 PM

    Toshiro Mifune is a mercenary looking to make some money in a lawless town in Akira Kurosawa’s tongue-in-cheek anti-epic, “a visually faultless and highly sophisticated satire on violence and human weakness” (Sight and Sound).

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  • Tokyo Olympiad

    Kon Ichikawa
    1965

    Digital Restoration

    Saturday, November 27 3:30 PM

    Tokyo Olympiad ranks among the greatest documents of sport ever committed to film. Kon Ichikawa and Kazuo Miyagawa examined the beauty and rich drama on display at the 1964 Summer Games in Tokyo.

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  • Gonza the Spearman

    Masahiro Shinoda
    Japan, 1986

    BAMPFA Collection
    Winner of the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival

    Sunday, November 28 5 PM

    Gonza the Spearman is based on an eighteenth-century bunraku play by Monzaemon Chikamatsu. Masahiro Shinoda established himself as a provocative independent stylist and an important bridge between art and commercial cinemas in Japan.

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