List of works by Akira Kurosawa explained

The following is a list of works, both in film and other media, for which the Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa made some documented creative contribution. This includes a complete list of films with which he was involved (including the films on which he worked as assistant director before becoming a full director), as well as his little-known contributions to theater, television and literature.

Filmography

As director

All the following are Japanese productions unless otherwise specified.

Year	English title	Japanese title	Romanized title<	-- ! scope="col" class="unsortable"	Notes	Ref. -->
1943	Sanshiro Sugata		Sugata Sanshirō
1944	The Most Beautiful		Ichiban utsukushiku
1945	Sanshiro Sugata Part II		Zoku Sugata Sanshirō
The Men Who Tread on the Tiger's Tail		Tora no o wo fumu otokotachi
1946	Those Who Make Tomorrow		Asu o tsukuru hitobito
No Regrets for Our Youth		Waga seishun ni kuinashi
1947	One Wonderful Sunday		Subarashiki nichiyōbi
1948	Drunken Angel		Yoidore tenshi
1949	The Quiet Duel		Shizukanaru kettō
Stray Dog		Nora inu
1950	Scandal		Sukyandaru (Shūbun)
Rashomon		Rashōmon
1951	The Idiot		Hakuchi
1952	Ikiru		Ikiru
1954	Seven Samurai		Shichinin no samurai
1955	I Live in Fear		Ikimono no kiroku
1957	Throne of Blood		Kumonosu-jō
The Lower Depths		Donzoko
1958	The Hidden Fortress		Kakushi toride no san akunin
1960	The Bad Sleep Well		Warui yatsu hodo yoku nemuru
1961	Yojimbo		Yōjinbō
1962	Sanjurō		Tsubaki Sanjūrō
1963	High and Low		Tengoku to jigoku
1965	Red Beard		Akahige
1970	Dodes'ka-den		Dodesukaden
1975	Dersu Uzala		Derusu Uzāra
1980	Kagemusha		Kagemusha
1985	Ran		Ran
1990	Dreams		Yume
1991	Rhapsody in August		Hachigatsu no rapusodī (Hachigatsu no kyōshikyoku)
1993	Madadayo		Mādadayo

As producer

Note: Data for the remainder of this filmography is derived primarily from the complete filmography created by Kurosawa's biographer, Stuart Galbraith IV, supplemented by IMDb's Kurosawa page.

For the following films that Kurosawa directed, he also received a production credit:

Stray Dog (associate producer)
Throne of Blood (co-producer)
The Lower Depths (producer)
The Hidden Fortress (co-producer)
The Bad Sleep Well (co-producer)
Yojimbo (associate producer)
Sanjuro (associate producer)
High and Low (associate producer)
Red Beard (associate producer)
Dodesukaden (executive producer and producer)
Kagemusha (producer).

In addition, Kurosawa received a production credit on one film that he himself did not direct: Haru no tawamure (1949) (Spring Flirtation), written and directed by Kajiro Yamamoto, on which he served as an associate producer.

As screenwriter

Kurosawa wrote or co-wrote the screenplays for all the films he himself directed. However, to supplement his income, he also wrote scripts for other Japanese directors throughout the 1940s, and even through the 1950s and part of the 1960s, long after he had become world-famous. He also worked on the scripts for two Hollywood productions he was slated to direct, but which, for complex reasons, were completed by and credited to other directors (although he did shoot some scenes for Tora tora tora!, the footage from which has apparently not survived). Finally, near the end of his life, he completed scripts he intended to direct but did not live to make, which were then filmed by others. A table of all these screenplays is given below; all titles are Japanese productions unless otherwise noted.

Year	English title	Japanese title	Romanized title	Director	Notes	Ref.
1941	Horse		Uma	Kajirō Yamamoto	Uncredited, but written alongside his mentor Kajirō Yamamoto.^[1]	^[2]
1942	Wind Currents of Youth		Seishun no kiryu	Shu Fushimizu	Based on "Construction of Love" and "The Life Plan" by Jun Minamikawa.
The Triumphant Song of the Wings		Tsubasa no gaika	Satsuo Yamamoto	Credited alongside Bonhei Sotoyama.
1943	Sanshiro Sugata		Sugata Sanshirō	Akira Kurosawa	Based on the novel Sugata Sanshirō by judoka Tsuneo Tomita.	^[3]
1944	Wrestling-ring Festival		Dohyōmatsuri	Santaro Marune		^[4]
The Most Beautiful		Ichiban utsukushiku	Akira Kurosawa
1945	Bravo! Tasuke Isshin		Appare Isshin Tasuke	Kiyoshi Saeki
	Sanshiro Sugata Part II		Zoku Sugata Sanshirō	Akira Kurosawa	Based on the novel Sugata Sanshirō by judoka Tsuneo Tomita.
	The Men Who Tread on the Tiger's Tail		Tora no o wo fumu otokotachi	Akira Kurosawa	Based on the kabuki play Kanjinchō.
	1946	No Regrets for Our Youth		Waga seishun ni kuinashi	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Eijiro Hisaita. Keiji Matsuzaki has an uncredited writer role.
1947	Four Love Stories "First Love"		Yotsu no koi no monogatari (Dai ichi: Hatsukoi)	Shiro Toyoda	Omnibus film. Credited for first of four sections.
	One Wonderful Sunday		Subarashiki nichiyōbi	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Keinosuke Uegusa.
Snow Trail		Ginrei no hate	Senkichi Taniguchi	Received main credit.^[5] Senkichi Taniguchi has an uncredited writer role.
1948	The Portrait		Shōzō	Keisuke Kinoshita
	Drunken Angel		Yoidore tenshi	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Keinosuke Uegusa.
1949	Lady from Hell		Jigoku no kifujin	Motoyoshi Oda	Credited alongside Motosada Nishikame.
	The Quiet Duel		Shizukanaru kettō	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Senkichi Taniguchi. Based on a play by Kazuo Kikuta.
Jakoman and Tetsu		Jakoman to Tetsu	Senkichi Taniguchi	Credited alongside Senkichi Taniguchi. Based on "Herring Fishery" by Keizo Kajino.
	Stray Dog		Nora inu	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ryūzō Kikushima.
1950	Escape at Dawn		Akatsuki no dassō	Senkichi Taniguchi	Credited alongside Senkichi Taniguchi. Based on a story by Yasujiro Tamura.
	Scandal		Sukyandaru (Shūbun)	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ryūzō Kikushima.
Tetsu of Jilba		Jiruba no Tetsu	Isamu Kosugi
	Rashomon		Rashomon	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Shinobu Hashimoto. Based on the short stories "In a Grove" and "Rashōmon" by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa.^[6]
Fencing Master		Tateshi danpei	Masahiro Makino
1951	Beyond Love and Hate		Ai to nikushimi no kanata e	Senkichi Taniguchi	Credited alongside Senkichi Taniguchi.^[7]
	The Idiot		Hakuchi	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Eijiro Hisaita. Based on The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky.
The Den of Beasts		Kedamono no yado	Tatsuo Osone
1952	Vendetta for a Samurai		Araki Mataemon: Kettô kagiya no tsuji	Kazuo Mori
Sword for Hire		Sengoku burai	Hiroshi Inagaki	Credited alongside Hiroshi Inagaki. Based on a novel by Yasushi Inoue, serialized in Sunday Mainichi.
	Ikiru		Ikiru	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Shinobu Hashimoto and Hideo Ogumi.
1953	Blow! Spring Wind		Fukeyo harukaze	Senkichi Taniguchi	Credited alongside Senkichi Taniguchi.
	1954	Seven Samurai		Shichinin no samurai	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Shinobu Hashimoto and Hideo Ogumi.
1955	Vanished Enlisted Man		Kieta chūtai	Akira Minura	Credited alongside Ryūzō Kikushima.	^[8]
	I Live in Fear		Ikimono no kiroku	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Shinobu Hashimoto and Hideo Ogumi.
Hiba Arborvitae Story		Asunaro monogatari	Hiromichi Horikawa		^[9]
Sanshiro Sugata		Sugata Sanshirō	Shigeo Tanaka	First remake of Sanshiro Sugata (1943) based on Kurosawa's script.
	1957	Throne of Blood		Kumonosu-jō	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Shinobu Hashimoto, Ryūzō Kikushima and Hideo Ogumi. Loosely based on Macbeth by William Shakespeare.
	The Lower Depths		Donzoko	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni. Based on The Lower Depths by Maxim Gorky.
Three Hundred Miles through Enemy Lines		Tekichū ōdan sanbyaku ri	Issei Mori	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni.^[10]
	1958	The Hidden Fortress		Kakushi toride no san akunin	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ryūzō Kikushima, Hideo Oguni, and Shinobu Hashimoto.
1959	Saga of the Vagabonds		Sengoku guntōden	Toshio Sugie	Credited alongside Sadao Yamanaka. Based on a story by Juro Miyoshi.
	1960	The Bad Sleep Well		Warui yatsu hodo yoku nemuru	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni, Eijiro Hisata, Ryūzō Kikushima, and Shinobu Hashimoto.
	1961	Yojimbo		Yōjinbō	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni and Ryūzō Kikushima.
	1962	Sanjurō		Tsubaki Sanjurō	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni and Ryūzō Kikushima. Based on a novel by Shūgorō Yamamoto.
Fencing Master		Tateshi danpei	Harumi Mizuho	A remake of Fencing Master (1950), which was written by Kurosawa.	^[11]
	1963	High and Low		Tengoku to jigoku	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Oguni and Ryūzō Kikushima. Based on the novel King's Ransom by Ed McBain.
1964	Jakoman and Tetsu		Jakoman to Tetsu	Kinji Fukasaku	A remake of Jakoman and Tetsu (1949), which was written by Kurosawa and Senkichi Taniguchi. Originally based on "Herring Fishery" by Keizo Kajino.
	1965	Red Beard		Akahige	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ryūzō Kikushima, Hideo Oguni, and Masato Ide. Based on the novel by Shūgorō Yamamoto.
Sanshiro Sugata		Sugata Sanshirō	Seiichirō Uchikawa	Second remake of Sanshiro Sugata (1943) based on Kurosawa's script. Kurosawa served as editor.
1970	Tora! Tora! Tora!		Tora! Tora	Tora!	Richard Fleischer, Toshio Masuda, Kinji Fukasaku, Akira Kurosawa (portions removed)	Credit received by Larry Forrester, Hideo Oguni, Ryūzō Kikushima; Kurosawa's credit for directing and writing was removed after his firing in December 1969. Based on the books Tora! Tora	Tora by Gordon W. Prange and The Broken Seal by Ladislas Farago.
	Dodes'ka-den		Dodesukaden	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Hideo Ogumi and Shinobu Hashimoto. Based on the novel The Town Without Seasons by Shūgorō Yamamoto.
	1975	Dersu Uzala		Derusu Uzāra	Akira Kurosawa	Japanese-Soviet co-production. Credited alongside Yuri Nagibin. Based on the novel Dersu Uzala by Vladimir Arsenyev.
	1980	Kagemusha		Kagemusha	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Masato Ide.
	1985	Ran		Ran	Akira Kurosawa	French-Japanese co-production. Credited alongside Hideo Oguni and Masato Ide. Loosely based on the play King Lear by William Shakespeare.
Runaway Train			Andrei Konchalovsky	American production. Originally set to be directed by Kurosawa. Contributions by Ryūzō Kikushima and Hideo Oguni are uncredited.
	1990	Dreams		Yume	Akira Kurosawa	Sole writer.
	1991	Rhapsody in August		Hachigatsu no rapusodī	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ishirō Honda. Based on the novel Nabe no naka by Kiyoko Murata.
	1993	Madadayo		Mādadayo	Akira Kurosawa	Credited alongside Ishirō Honda. Based on works by Hyakken Uchida.
2000	After the Rain		Ame agaru	Takashi Koizumi	Posthumous script and final screenplay by Kurosawa. Based on a short story by Shūgorō Yamamoto.
Dora-heita		Doraheita	Kon Ichikawa	Credited alongside Kon Ichikawa, Keisuke Kinoshita, and Masaki Kobayashi. Based on the novel Diary of a Town Magistrate by Shuguro Yamamoto.
2002	The Sea Is Watching		Umi wa miteta	Kei Kumai	Sole writer. Posthumous credit.	^[12]

In addition, Kurosawa wrote the following unproduced scripts, composed during the pre-war period in the 1930s and also the wartime period in the 1940s, either when he was still an assistant director or had just graduated to full director. Some of these won prizes in screenwriting contests, establishing his reputation as a promising talent even though they were never filmed.

Deruma-dera no doitsujin – A German at Daruma Temple
Shizukanari – All Is Quiet
Yuki – Snow
Mori no senichia – A Thousand and One Nights in the Forest
Jajauma monogatari – The Story of a Bad Horse
Dokkoi kono yari – The Lifted Spear
San Paguita no hana – The San Pajuito Flower
Utsukishiki koyomi – Beautiful Calendar
Daisan hatoba – The Third Harbor

As assistant director

Year	Romanization of Japanese Title	English Title	Director
1936
Shojo Hanazono	Paradise of the Virgin Flowers	Shigeo Yagura	Third Assistant Director
Enoken no senman chōja	Enoken's Ten Million (The Millionaire or Enoken the Millionaire)	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Zoku Enoken no senman chōja	Enoken's Ten Million Sequel	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Tōkyō rapusodi	Tokyo Rhapsody	Shū Fushimizu	Third Assistant Director
1937
Sengoku guntō-den – Dai ichibu Tora-ōkami (Sengoku guntō-den – Zenpen Tora-ōkami)	Saga of the Vagabonds – Part One: Tiger-wolf	Eisuke Takizawa	Third Assistant Director
Sengoku guntō-den – Dai nibu Akatsuki no zenhin (Sengoku guntō-den – Kōhen Akatsuki no zenhin)	Saga of the Vagabonds – Part Two: Forward at Dawn	Eisuke Takizawa	Third Assistant Director
Otto no teisō – Haru kureba (Otto no teisō – Zenpen Haru kureba)	A Husband's Chastity – If Spring Comes	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Otto no teisō – Aki futatabi (Otto no teisō – Kōhen Aki futatabi)	A Husband's Chastity – Fall Again	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Nihon josei dokuhon	Japanese Women's Textbook	Kajirō Yamamoto (Volume I only)	Third Assistant Director (Volume I only)
Nadare	Avalanche	Mikio Naruse	Assistant Director
Enoken no chakkiri Kinta – Zenpen Mamayo sandogasa: Ikiha yoiyoi	Enoken's Chikiri Kinta Part 1 – Momma, the Hat: The Nice Way	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Enoken no chakkiri Kinta – Kōhen kaeri wa Kowai mateba hiyori	Enoken's Chikiri Kinta Part 2 – Returning Is Scary, but the Weather Will Clear If You Wait	Kajirō Yamamoto	Third Assistant Director
Utsukushiki taka	The Beautiful Hawk	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
1938
Chinetsu	Subterranean Heat	Eisuke Takizawa	Chief Assistant Director
Tōjūrō no koi	Tojuro's Love	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Tsuzurikata kyōshitsu	Composition Class	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Enoken no bikkuri jinsei	Enoken's Surprising Life	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
1939
Enoken no gatchiri jidai	Enoken's Shrewd Period	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Chūshingura – Kōhen	Chushingura Part 2	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Nonki Yokochō	Easy Alley	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
1940
Roppa no shinkon ryokō	Roppa's Honeymoon	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Enoken no zangiri Kinta	Enoken's Cropped Kinta	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Songokū – Zenpen	Songoku Part 1	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
Songokū – Kōhen	Songoku Part 2	Kajirō Yamamoto	Chief Assistant Director
1941
Uma	Horse	Kajirō Yamamoto	Second Unit Director (Also, editor, co-screenwriter and co-director (uncredited))

As editor

Kurosawa edited all his own films, though he only occasionally took screen credit for it. There are, however, a few instances in which he edited the work of others, as listed below.

Horse (1941) (Uma), directed by Kajiro Yamamoto (also second unit director, co-writer (uncredited), co-director (uncredited))
Snow Trail (1947) (Ginrei no hate), directed and co-edited by Senkichi Taniguchi (also co-writer)
Hiba Arborvitae Story (1955) (Asunaro monogatari) (also co-writer), directed by Hiromichi Horikawa

Theater work

During the mid-to-late 1940s, for the first and apparently the only time in his career, Akira Kurosawa involved himself in a number of theater-related projects.

Shaberu (Talking) – In 1945, immediately after the war, Kurosawa wrote a one-act play entitled Talking, for, in his words, "Kawaguchi's troupe" (presumably meaning playwright Matsutarō Kawaguchi, who was prominent at this time and who also worked in the film industry). The central character of the drama is a fish merchant who, during the war, greatly admires Prime Minister Tōjō. In emulation of his patriarchal hero, the merchant plays the tyrant at home, but when the war ends, his angry family members air their long pent-up grievances against him. Kurosawa called it "a comic treatment of... Japanese who all begin talking at once", because "we who had been able to express nothing of what we were thinking up to that time [the end of the war] all began talking at once."
Yoidore Tenshi (Drunken Angel) – During the Toho strike of 1948, when Kurosawa could not work, he wrote and directed a stage adaptation of his acclaimed 1948 film (see above), with Takashi Shimura and Toshiro Mifune playing the same roles they played in the movie. The production ran for brief periods in a number of Japanese cities, apparently with great success.
Predlozhenia (A Marriage Proposal) by Anton Chekhov – Also during the Toho strike, Kurosawa directed a production of this popular early Chekhov farce. Neither the actors who appeared in the production nor its reception by the public is known.^[13] At some point in the 2010s, the film was rediscovered. It was remastered and released on DVD by the American independent company SamuraiDVD in 2017, complete with English subtitles.^[15]

Books

Prior to writing the screenplay to his film, Stray Dog (Nora Inu, 1949), Kurosawa created, in about six weeks, a novel based on the same story (presumably also called Stray Dog), which he never published. It was written in the style of one of his favorite writers, the French crime author Georges Simenon. Writing it was supposed to help him compose the script as quickly as possible, but he found that writing the screenplay took even longer than usual because of the complex differences between literature and film.

In 1980, inspired by the memoir of one of his heroes, Jean Renoir, he began to publish in serial form his autobiography, entitled Gama no abura (An Oily Toad). The book deals with the period from the director's birth to his winning the Golden Lion for Rashomon from the Venice Film Festival in 1951; the period from 1951 through 1980 is not covered. The title of the book is a reference to a legend according to which, if one places a deformed toad in a box full of mirrors, it will become so afraid of its own reflection that it will begin to sweat, and this sweat allegedly had medicinal properties. Kurosawa compared himself to the toad, nervous about having to contemplate, through the process of writing his life story, his own multiple "reflections." It was published as a book in Japan in 1981, and in English translation the following year under the title Something Like an Autobiography. The book's appearance coincided with the revival of interest in Kurosawa's work following the international release of Kagemusha.

In 1999, his book, Yume wa tensai de aru (A Dream Is a Genius) was published posthumously. It has not been translated into English, except for Chapter 3. This chapter consists of a selection of 100 of the director's favorite films, listed in chronological order, with detailed commentaries on each film, all given at the request of Kurosawa's daughter, Kazuko. (Since he deliberately limits himself to one film per director, however, the list emerges as more of a "favorite directors" list than a "greatest films" list.) This chapter, but not the remainder of the book, can be found in English on the Internet.

Complete Drawings (with text in Japanese) was published by Shogakukan in 1999.

The screenplays of many of Kurosawa's films have been published in English. For further information, consult the Wikipedia articles relating to the individual films.

References

Notes

Book: Richie, Donald . The films of Akira Kurosawa . University of California Press . 1999 . 0-520-22037-4 . 3 . Berkeley, Calif. . 41038353 . Donald Richie.
Drunken Angel . . . CITEREFDrunken Angel.
Book: Galbraith IV, Stuart . The Emperor and the Wolf: The Lives and Films of Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune . Faber and Faber, Inc . 2002 . 0-571-19982-8 . New York-London . CITEREFGalbraith.
Book: Kurosawa, Akira . Something Like an Autobiography . Something Like an Autobiography . . Bock . Audie . Audie Bock . 1982 . 0-394-50938-2 . New York.
Book: Kurosawa, Akira . Yume wa tensai de aru (A Dream Is a Genius) . Bungei Shunjū . 1999 . 4-16-355570-6 . Tokyo.
Book: Nogami, Teruyo . Teruyo Nogami . Waiting on the Weather . Stone Bridge Press . 2006 . 978-1-933330-09-9 . Berkeley . CITEREFNogami.
Seven Samurai: 3-disc Remastered Edition (Criterion Collection Spine #2) . Criterion . . CITEREFSeven Samurai.

Notes and References

Book: Conrad, David A. . Akira Kurosawa and Modern Japan . McFarland & Company . 2022 . 978-1-4766-4637-4 . English . 1313904540.
Book: Galbraith IV, Stuart . The Toho Studios story: a history and complete filmography . Scarecrow Press . 2008 . 978-1-4616-7374-3 . 852899281.
Book: Richie, Donald . The films of Akira Kurosawa . University of California Press . 1998 . 0-520-22037-4 . 3rd . Berkeley, Calif. . English . 41038353.
Book: Erens, Patricia . Akira Kurosawa: a guide to references and resources . G.K. Hall . 1979 . 0-8161-7994-8 . Gottesman . Ronald . A Reference Publication in Film . Boston . 4498268.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . Japanese Movie Database . 銀嶺の果て . 2023-09-08 . Japanese Movie Database.
Book: Galbraith IV, Stuart . The Japanese filmography: a complete reference to 209 filmmakers and the over 1250 films released in the United States, 1900 through 1994 . . 1996 . 0786400323 . Jefferson . en-US.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . Japanese Movie Database . 愛と憎しみの彼方へ . Japanese Movie Database.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . ソ満国境２号作戦　消えた中隊 . Japanese Movie Database.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . 生きものの記録 . Japanese Movie Database.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . 日露戦争勝利の秘史　敵中横断三百里 . Japanese Movie Database.
Web site: Japanese Movie Database . 殺陣師段平 . Japanese Movie Database.
Web site: Mitchell . Elvis . 2003-07-18 . FILM REVIEW; A Director's Wooziness Finds Kurosawa's Softer Side . 2022-05-26 . The New York Times . en-US.
Web site: Manula . Vili . Other Films with Akira Kurosawa's Involvement . Akira Kurosawa info . 23 August 2010.
Television work

A documentary about horses called Song of the Horse (or Uma no Uta), directed by Kurosawa, was broadcast in Japan, supposedly on August 31, 1970 (Kurosawa otherwise totally avoided working in television). Very little is known about the film, and its release date is even in question. For instance, though the film is often said to have aired in August 1970, it is thought that the film features footage of events that did not take place until the summer of 1971. It was considered a lost film for decades and was not available on home video in any form.^[13]
Web site: Maunula . Vili . Review: Song of the Horse (Kurosawa 1971 / SamuraiDVD) . Akira Kurosawa info . 12 September 2020.