Directors

Ishiro Honda	Jun Fukuda	Masaaki Tezuka
Shusuke Kaneko	Noriaki Yuasa	Ryuhei Kitamura

Click on the links above to view the other kaiju film directors!

Ishiro Honda

Ishiro Honda, born May 7, 1911, loved movies ever since he was a small child and realised early that he could have a future in films. After high school, Mr. Honda studied film at Nippon University and after graduating, went to work for the filmmaking company PCL in 1933, where he worked as an assistant director. Ishiro Honda also served in the military for eight years after being drafted, but continued to work on films in between military assignments. During one of his assignments, he was captured and spent a full year as a prisoner of war in China, but was released when the war ended and returned to film making at PCL. However, in 1951, he was called to work at Toho in 1951. His directorial debut at Toho came later that year in the film, "The Blue Pearl". Then, the following year, he teamed up for the first, but definately not last time, with producer Tomoyuki Tanaka and special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya for the film, "The Man Who Came to the Bay". Two years later, Honda made his first special effects feature, "Eagle of the Pacific", with Eiji Tsuburaya. These two also teamed up for the film "Farewell Rabaul" before teaming up with music composer Akira Ifukube and again producer Tomoyuki Tanaka to make the masterpiece "Godzilla: King of the Monsters". From this point, his career increasingly shifted towards science fiction and special effects films, directing such great monster epics as "Rodan", "The Mysterians", and "Mothra". Honda would continue to work off and on in the Godzilla series and other monster films from 1954 until 1975.
After directing Terror of MechaGodzilla in 1975, he worked mostly with Akira Kurosawa as a assistant director in all his films from "Kagemusha the Shadow Warrior" until the film "Dreams". The two were very closed an enjoyed working together very much. Ishiro Honda died on February 28, 1993 at Kono Hospital in Tokyo, Japan at the age of 81, survived by his wife Kimi, his son Ryuji, and a daughter. Altogether he worked on 46 feature films throughout his career, his career ultimately defined by his work on Toho monster and science fiction films, but Honda didn't mind, he enjoyed working on these films a lot. Mr. Honda even considered Godzilla: King of the Monsters his best work out of all the films he directed.

Filmography
The Blue Pearl (1951)
The Man Who Came to The Bay (1952)
Adolescence Part II (1953)
Eagle of the Pacific (1953)
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (1954)
Love Makeup (1955)
The Young Tree (1956)
Night School (1956)
Goodbye People of Tokyo (1956)
Rodan (1956)
The Mysterians (1957)
Rodan (1957)
Good Luck to These Two (1957)
Half Human (1957)
The H-Man (1958)
Varan (1958)
An Echo Calls You (1959)
Battle in Outer Space (1960)
Mothra (1961)
King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)
Gorath (1962)
Atragon (1963)
Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)
Ghidorah: The Three-Headed Monster (1964)
Dogora The Space Monster (1964)
Godzilla vs. Monster Zero (1965)
Frankenstein Conquers the World (1965)
King Kong Escapes (1967)
Destroy All Monsters (1968)
Godzilla's Revenge (1969)
Yog: Monster From Space (1970)
Mirrorman (1971)
Terror of MechaGodzilla (1975)
Akira Kurosawa's Dreams (1990)
Not Yet (1993)
PLUS MANY MORE!!!

Jun Fukuda

Born on February 17, 1923 in Manshu, Korea, Jun Fukuda's family moved to Japan where he studied films at Japan Art University before being drafted into World War II. After the war, he became an assistant director at Toho Studios and was even the assistant director on Rodan (1956). Both before and after working on films in the Godzilla series, he worked on other projects handed to him by Toho and even wrote for the TV series, Zone Fighter, which featured Godzilla, King Ghidorah, and Gigan in a few of it's episodes. The Godzilla movies he worked on weren't as good as the ones directed by Ishiro Honda, but it wasn't completely his fault because of the constantly decreasing film budgets. Mr. Fukuda did not share the same affinity for the Godzilla series as Mr. Honda did either, which probably was the other part of the problem. He did, however, have a good relationship with Eiji Tsuburaya and Masaru Sato and that probably led to success in the five Godzilla films he directed. Jun Fukuda passed away on December 3, 2000 of cancer.

Filmography
Playing with Fire (1959)
The Telegraphed Man (1960)
The Merciless Trap (1961)
Witness Killed (1961)
Weed of Crime (1962)
Operation Mad Dog (1963)
Blood and Diamonds (1964)
100 Shot, 100 Killed (1965)
White Rose of Hong Kong (1965)
The Mad Atlantic (1966)
Godzilla vs. The Sea Monster (1966)
Sensation Seekers (1966)
Son of Godzilla (1967)
Golden Eyes (1968)
Godzilla vs. Gigan (1972)
Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973)
Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla (1974)
Battle in Outer Space II (1977)
PLUS MANY MORE!!!

Masaaki Tezuka

Born in Tochigi, Japan, on January 24, 1955, Masaaki Tezuka graduated from the Nihon University of Art with a degree in cinema in 1977 and became a freelance assistant director. Over the next 22 years, he worked on such movies as Kinji Fukasaku's “Virus” and Yasuo Furuhata's “Buddies”, but spent most of that time apprenticing under director Kon Ichikawa, whom Tezuka deeply respected, and assisted him on no less than 14 films. Masaaki Tezuka was also a lifelong fan of Toho's Godzilla series, Tezuka worked on Takao Okawara's “Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla II” in 1993 and then joined Toho Studios as a full employee in 1994. Following assistant director assignments on “The Rebirth of Mothra” parts 2 and 3, Tezuka realized his childhood dream when executive producer Shogo Tomiyama promoted him to director for 2000's “Godzilla X Megaguirus”. While the film faired poorly at the box office, Toho soon realized that their new director had a great deal of potential. For their next film, “GMK: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack”, Toho hired Heisei Gamera director Shusuke Kaneko to direct, but Massaki Tezuka was their as well. Tezuka volunteered as an assistant (director of composite footage) on GMK because he wanted to learn from Kaneko, and he used what he learned in his next Godzilla film, “Godzilla X MechaGodzilla”, taking a more proactive role in the production by making changes to the film's crew and reworking portions of the script. For GMK, Tezuka also had a small cameo appearance as a JSDF officer and had another cameo in his film, Godzilla X MechaGodzila. Most recently, Masaaki Tezuka worked on the 27th Godzilla film, “Godzilla X Mothra X MechaGodzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.”, which was released on December 13, 2003. Mr. Tezuka co-wrote the screenplay for GMM: Tokyo S.O.S. with GMK's Masahiro Yokotani.

Thanks to Henshin! Online for much of this information!

Filmography
Virus (1980)
Koto: The Ancient City (1980)
The Burmese Harp (1983)
47 Ronin (1984)
Princess from the Moon (1987)
Buddies (1990)
Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla II (1993)
The Rebirth of Mothra II (1997)
The Rebirth of Mothra III (1998)
Godzilla X Megaguirus (2000)
Godzilla X MechaGodzilla (2002)
GMM: Tokyo S.O.S. (2003)

Shusuke Kaneko

Director Shusuke Kaneko, born on June 8, 1955 in Tokyo, Japan, discovered his flair for films and the creation process as a teenager, however, due to a cinema slump in Japan, his hopes for a film career were put off for some time. Later, after graduating with an elementary school degree, he applied at Nikatsu Studios and got a position as an assistant director. His early a.d. duties consisted mainly of romantic films, but would later come unto his own as a director with films like Last Cabaret and the recent Crossfire. Kaneko is mainly known to Western kaiju fans as the director of the wildly popular Heisei Gamera films, which have won accolades from both Japanese and American fans, as well as various Japanese cinema awards. In 2001, a dream came true for the long-time director and fans alike when Kaneko was hired by Toho to direct his first Godzilla film: Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack, which was released in December 2001 in Japan.

Filmography
Last Cabaret (1988)
Summer Vacation 1999 (1988)
Hong Kong Paradise (1990)
From Dracula with Love (1991)
It's a Summer Vacation Everyday (1994)
Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995)
Necromonicon: The Book of the Dead (1996)
Gamera 2: Advent of Legion (1996)
School Ghost Story (1997)
Gamera 3: Revenge of Irys (1999)
Crossfire (2000)
GMK: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001)
To Sing of Love (2002)
A Toast to Love (2003)
PLUS MANY MORE!!!

Noriaki Yuasa

Noriaki Yuasa, father of Gamera, directed all the films in the original series except for Gamera vs. barugon, in which he directed the special effects footage. Mr. Yuasa originally got into the film industry as an actor, taking after his father and grandmothers, plus he lived in housing for members of the film industry. Mr. Yuasa and his friends would even occasionally be asked to appear as extras, thus beginning his work on stage productions. He was eventually given a leading role in a play, but because of the air raids during World War II, the opening of the show was postponed and then cancelled. However, this worked out in his favor, for he was never very interested in acting because he was raised amidst actors and actresses who had illicit love affairs all the time and was very bothered by their behavior. Thus beginning his long and incredible acting career. His dislike of lude behavior is also the reason by Gamera's affection toward children and the film's child-friendly tone. Sadly, Noriaki Yuasa passed away on June 14, 2004 of a cerebral infarction (stroke), he will be missed.

Filmography
If You're Happy, Clap Your Hands (1964)
Gamera (1965)
Gamera vs. Gyaos (1967)
The Snake Girl and the Silver Haired Witch (1968)
Gamera vs. Viras (1968)
Gamera vs. Guiron (1969)
Gamera vs. Jiger (1970)
Gamera vs. Zigra (1971)
Electroid Zaborger (1974)
Cashan (1974)
Gamera Super Monster (1980)
Ultraman 80 (1980)
PLUS MANY MORE!!!

Ryuhei Kitamura

Born on May 30, 1969 in Osaka, Japan, Ryuhei Kitamura has become one of the most famous Japanese directors and has gained a large international following for work on his films like “Versus” and “Azumi”. Kitamura has also quickly carved his own niche in the world of Japanese cinema for making films the way that “he likes them”. And after accomplishing all of this, his career is still just getting started.

Kitamura has been into films for basically all of his life. He grew up watching movies over and over from morning until night, he rarely even went to school. Then, when he turned sixteen, Kitamura decided to make his passion his profession and a year later he quit high school to journey to Australia to look for a film school. He soon found a school for visual arts in Sydney and ended up studying there for two years until he graduated, but he says that the movies were his actual teachers. His favorites and the films that he is most influenced by are those of Australian directors George Miller and Peter Weir as well as American directors Sam Raimi, James Cameron, and John Carpenter. However, his influences don’t stop with film, Kitamura is also heavily influenced by books and comic books. Kitamura is also not a big fan of CGI (computer graphics imaging) because it looks very fake to him, he prefers the handmade American films of the 1970s and 1980s like “Evil Dead”, “Highlander”, and “The Terminator”.

Up until Kitamura made his multi-genre film, “Versus”, he was very frustrated with Japanese films because the industry wasn't making entertainment movies anymore. They were only making love stories, family stories, or stories about finding yourself. He says that the pure entertainment movies didn't exist in Japan until he made Versus, since the industry in Japan was convinced that Hollywood and Hong Kong were much better at making those types of films then they were. Kitamura disagreed and then decided to make independent films through his production company “Napalm Films”, since no producer in Japan would back up his ideas. However, since becoming a part of the Japanese film industry, Kitamura’s attitude has changed. Mostly thanks to producer Mata Yamamoto, who decided that Kitamura was the one to direct the film “Azumi” after seeing Versus at the Yubari Fantastic Film Festival, before the film was even in wide release. Azumi was released in 2003 and was the biggest film of the year in Japan, a huge achievement for Kitamura who feels that he did more than his best on the film.

Soon after Azumi’s success was made known throughout Japan, Toho Studios approached Kitamura about directing and co-writing Godzilla: Final Wars, the final installment and 50th Anniversary film for their infamous mutated dinosaur. At the time, Kitamura was initially thinking of moving to the United States to pursue a film career in Hollywood, but he couldn’t pass up the chance to direct the last and biggest Godzilla film of all. However, once the film is completed and released to the Japanese public, Ryuhei Kitamura says that he will make his move to Hollywood, but still continue to make films in Japan.

Filmography
Exit (1988)
Heat After Dark (1996)
Down to Hell (1996)
Versus (2000)
Alive (2002)
Jam Films (2002)
Aragami (2003)
Azumi (2003)
The Messenger (2003)
Sky High (TV Series) (2003)
Godzilla: Final Wars (2004)