is a Japanese entertainment company. Founded in 1895, it initially managed kabuki theaters in Kyoto; in 1914, it also acquired ownership of the Kabuki-za theater in Tokyo. In 1920, Shochiku entered the film production industry and established the Kamata Film Studio. Currently, it is considered one of Japan's Big Four film studios and is the oldest among the Big Four. Shochiku is a member of the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan (MPPAJ).

It also produces and distributes anime films, in particular those produced by Sunrise, a division of Bandai Namco Filmworks (which has a long-time partnership—the company released most, if not all, anime films produced by Sunrise). Its best remembered directors include Yasujirō Ozu, Kenji Mizoguchi, Mikio Naruse, Keisuke Kinoshita and Yōji Yamada. It has also produced films by highly regarded independent and "loner" directors such as Takashi Miike, Takeshi Kitano, Akira Kurosawa, Masaki Kobayashi and Taiwanese New Wave director Hou Hsiao-hsien.

History

As Shochiku Kinema

thumb|left|Otani Takejiro and Shirai Matsujiro in 1932

The company was founded in 1895 as a kabuki production company and later began producing films in 1920. Shochiku is considered the oldest company in Japan involved in present-day film production,

Shochiku grew quickly in the early years, expanding its business to many other Japanese live theatrical styles, including Noh and Bunraku, and established a near monopoly due to its ownership of theaters, as well as kabuki and shimpa drama troupes.

The company began making films in 1920, about a decade after its main rival Nikkatsu. The company sought to break away from the prevailing pattern of jidai-geki and to emulate Hollywood standards. It was the first film studio to abandon the use of female impersonators and brought new ideas, including the star system and the sound stage to Japan. It built its main studio at Kamata, named Shochiku Kamata Studio, between Tokyo and Yokohama, and hired Henry Kotani, a Japanese who had worked in Hollywood as an actor and cameraman to direct its first film, Island Woman (Shima no Onna, 1920). It also hired the prominent theater director Kaoru Osanai to head a school at the studio, which produced the film Souls on the Road (1921), a film directed by Minoru Murata which is considered "the first landmark film in Japanese history".

However, Shochiku's early history was difficult, as audiences preferred the more action-packed jidai-geki historical swashbucklers over the shinpa melodramas, and its Kamata studios were destroyed by the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake, forcing a temporary relocation to Kyoto. with stories reflecting the lives of the lower-middle urban classes. These dramas proved immensely popular, and marked the start of the careers of many prominent directors (including Ozu, Naruse, and Hiroshi Shimizu) and actors (including Kinuyo Tanaka).

In 1931, Shochiku released the first "talkie" made in Japan: The Neighbor's Wife and Mine (Madamu to nyōbō, 1930). Filming became increasingly difficult at the Kamata studios during the 1930s with the rapid industrialization of the surrounding area, such as the construction of munitions factories and metal foundries, and Shochiku decided to close the studio and relocate to Ofuna, near Kamakura in 1936. The following year, Shochiku Kinema was merged with its parent company, Shochiku Entertainment, and adopted the new name of Shochiku Corporation.

In 1953, after the end of the occupation, Kido returned to Shochiku and revived the melodramatic style of films which had been a Shochiku trademark in the pre-war era. Directors associated with Shochiku in this era included Ozu, Keisuke Kinoshita, and Noboru Nakamura. Many of the films during the 1950s were aimed primarily at female audiences. In particular, Hideo Oba's three-part What is Your Name? (Kimi no na wa?) in 1953 was the most commercially successful film of the period.

Toho was Shochiku's primary rival during this period, competing for talent and properties as well as with the influx of Hollywood films and the rise of television. By the start of the 1960s, Shochiku's films were criticized as “old-fashioned” with the popularity of rival Nikkatsu’s Taiyo-zoku youth-orientated movies. The studio responded by launching the Japanese New Wave (Nuberu bagu) which also launched the career of Nagisa Oshima among others,

The Ofuna studio was briefly transformed into a theme park, Kamakura Cinema World, but this was closed in 1998 and the site was sold off in 2000 to Kamakura Women's College. Since that time, Shochiku has relied on its film studio and backlot in Kyoto. Yamada’s “The Twilight Samurai” (Tasogare Seibei, 2002) was nominated for an Oscar as Best Foreign Language Picture.

  • Carmen Comes Home (1951); in Color
  • [[The Idiot (1951 film)|The

Idiot]] (1951); in Monochrome

  • Twenty-Four Eyes (1954)
  • The Mask of Destiny (1955)
  • The Ballad of Narayama (1958); in Color/GrandScope
  • Harakiri (1962) a.k.a. Sepuku; in Shochiku-Regalscope
  • Samurai Spy (1962) a.k.a. Spy Hunter; in Shochiku-European Scope
  • The X From Outer Space (1967) a.k.a. Uchu daikaiju Guirara / Giant Space Monster Guilala, directed by Kazui Nihonmatsu; in Color/Scope
  • Black Lizard (1968) a.k.a. Kurotokage; in Color/Scope
  • Curse of the Blood/ Kaidan zankoku monogatari (1968) a.k.a. Cruel Ghost Legend; in Color/Scope
  • Goké, Body Snatcher from Hell (1968) a.k.a. Vampire Gokemidoro; in Color/Scope
  • Genocide (1968) a.k.a. War of the Insects, directed by Kazui Nihonmatsu; in Color/Scope
  • The Black Rose Inn (1969) a.k.a. Kurobarano yakata
  • The Rendezvous (1972); in Color (Fujicolor)/CinemaScope
  • The Castle of Sand (1974); in Color/Scope
  • Village of the Eight Gravestones (1977) a.k.a. Yatsu hukamura
  • Children of Nagasaki (1982); in Color/Widescreen
  • Super Mario Bros.: The Great Mission to Rescue Princess Peach! (1986), animated feature film
  • Hachikō Monogatari (1987) a.k.a. The Tale of Hachikō, directed by Seijirō Kōyama
  • The Discarnates (1988); in Color/VistaVision
  • Venus Wars (1989), animated feature film
  • The Guyver (1991), co-produced with Brian Yuzna
  • A Silent Voice (2016), animated feature film
  • Violet Evergarden: Eternity and the Auto Memory Doll (2019)
  • Tokyo Taxi (2025)

See also

  • Asakusa International Theater, a former movie theater
  • Toho
  • Shintoho
  • Tsuburaya Productions
  • Daiei Film
  • Kadokawa Daiei Studio
  • Nikkatsu
  • Toei Company

References

  • Shochiku Co., Ltd.