Yuzo Kawashima

Yuzo Kawashima (川島雄三) (4 February 1918-11 June 1963) was a notable Japanese filmmaker, most famous for making tragi-comic films dealing with the lives of lower-class Japanese people, especially those involved in petty crime or employed in red light districts. He was a key influence on Shohei Imamura, who worked as his assistant director and referred to him as "my teacher." Imamura later remade Kawashima's 1957 film Sun in the Last Days of the Shogunate as Eijanka.

Kawashima was born in Mutsu, Aomori and educated at Meiji University. Like many Japanese directors of the period, Kawashima was very prolific, completing 36 films during a career that only lasted 19 years.

Filmography

 * Ojōsan shachō (お嬢さん社長), lit. "Madame Company President" (1953)
 * Suzaki paradise: Akashingō (洲崎パラダイス　赤信号 Suzaki paradaisu Akashingō) aka Suzaki Paradise Red Light (1956)
 * Sun in the Last Days of the Shogunate (幕末太陽傳, Bakumatsu taiyōden) (1957)