Takeshi Katō

Acting

Takeshi Katō

Born 1929-05-24 · Tokyo, Japan

Takeshi Katō (加藤 武 Katō Takeshi, 24 May 1929 – 31 July 2015) was a Japanese stage and film actor. He appeared in more than one hundred films.

Acting credits

Seven Samurai poster
8.5

A samurai answers a village's request for protection after he falls on hard times. The town needs protection from bandits, so the samurai gathers six others to help him teach the people how to defend themselves, and the villagers provide the soldiers with food.

Seven Samurai

1954

Ran poster
8.0

Shakespeare's King Lear is reimagined as a singular historical epic set in sixteenth-century Japan where an aging warlord divides his kingdom between his three sons.

Ran

1985

High and Low poster
8.4

A Yokohama shoe executive faces a wrenching choice when kidnappers mistakenly seize his chauffeur’s son but demand the ransom anyway.

High and Low

1963

Throne of Blood poster
7.9

Returning to their lord's castle, samurai warriors Washizu and Miki are waylaid by a spirit who predicts their futures. When the first part of the spirit's prophecy comes true, Washizu's scheming wife, Asaji, presses him to speed up the rest of the spirit's prophecy by murdering his lord and usurping his place. Director Akira Kurosawa's resetting of William Shakespeare's "Macbeth" in feudal Japan is one of his most acclaimed films.

Throne of Blood

1957

XX: Beautiful Weapon poster
8.9

A blind female assassin lives alone in a remote house; her superiors occasionally send her "clients" / targets that she shoots right after having sex with them in her completely darkened bedroom.

XX: Beautiful Weapon

1993

Yojimbo poster
8.1

A nameless ronin, or samurai with no master, enters a small village in feudal Japan where two rival businessmen are struggling for control of the local gambling trade. Taking the name Sanjuro Kuwabatake, the ronin convinces both silk merchant Tazaemon and sake merchant Tokuemon to hire him as a personal bodyguard, then artfully sets in motion a full-scale gang war between the two ambitious and unscrupulous men.

Yojimbo

1961

The Hidden Fortress poster
8.0

In feudal Japan, during a bloody war between clans, two cowardly and greedy peasants, soldiers of a defeated army, stumble upon a mysterious man who guides them to a fortress hidden in the mountains.

The Hidden Fortress

1958

Battleship Yamato poster
NR

Kon Ichikawa's war film depicts the 60-hour period from the departure of the battleship Yamato, the pride of the Japanese Navy, until its sinking by the American forces during Operation Ten-Go.

Battleship Yamato

1990

The Tempō Outlaws of the Marsh poster
NR

A great famine struck all of Japan: the so-called Great Tenpō famine. It was a time when there were frequent uprisings in rural areas due to farmers losing their land as a result of strict tax collection. The Tonegawa area of ​​Boso was a lawless area for a generation, as two major forces fought against each other: Sukegoro of Iioka, who wields power with his industrial capital behind him, and Shigezo of Sasakawa, a rising yakuza. Furthermore, the successive floods of the Tone River, which could be called fate, forced the farmers into even more poverty and despair. Meanwhile, farmers in Nabe Village continue to live a lethargic life, but agricultural reform is about to begin under the hands of Yugaku Ohara, a ronin who has settled in the village.

The Tempō Outlaws of the Marsh

1976

Free and Easy 17 poster
5.8

Yumiko returns to work in Hama-chan's department. She had once left the company after getting married, but a dark shadow now seems to loom over her.

Free and Easy 17

2006

Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create: 'High and Low' poster
NR

Documentary made by Toho for the Masterworks reissue of all of its Kurosawa films. This one focuses on "High and Low" (1963).

Akira Kurosawa: It Is Wonderful to Create: 'High and Low'

2002

Mifune: The Last Samurai poster
7.0

An account of the life and work of legendary Japanese actor Toshirō Mifune (1920-97), the most prominent actor of the Golden Age of Japanese cinema.

Mifune: The Last Samurai

2016

Godzilla 1985 poster
6.8

Originally released in Japan as "The Return of Godzilla" in 1984, this is the heavily re-edited, re-titled "Godzilla 1985". Adding in new footage of Raymond Burr, this 16th Godzilla film ignores all previous sequels and serves as a direct follow-up to the 1956 "Godzilla King of the Monsters", which also featured scenes with Burr edited into 1954's "Godzilla". This film restores the darker tone of the original, as we witness the nuclear destruction of giant lizard terrorizing Japan.

Godzilla 1985

1985

The Bad Sleep Well poster
7.7

In this loose adaptation of "Hamlet," illegitimate son Kôichi Nishi climbs to a high position within a Japanese corporation and marries the crippled daughter of company vice president Iwabuchi. At the reception, the wedding cake is a replica of their corporate headquarters, but an aspect of the design reminds the party of the hushed-up death of Nishi's father. It is then that Nishi unleashes his plan to avenge his father's death.

The Bad Sleep Well

1960

Love and Faith poster
6.4

Sen Rikyu is a ceremonial tea master who advises warlord Hideyoshi in sixteenth-century feudal Japan. His daughter, the beautiful Lady Ogin, has an unrequited love for Lord Ukon, who has angered Hideyoshi by becoming a Christian convert. Ogin's father Rikyu also displeases Hideyoshi by opposing the warlord's plan to invade China and Korea. When the animalistic Hideyoshi is rejected by Ogin, he threatens her and her father with arrest and worse.

Love and Faith

1978

Lonely Heart poster
7.5

A police procedural surrounding murder at a bookstore and the private lives of the cops trying to solve the case.

Lonely Heart

1981

None But the Brave poster
6.4

American and Japanese soldiers, stranded on a tiny Pacific island during World War II, must make a temporary truce and cooperate to survive various tribulations. Told through the eyes of the American and Japanese unit commanders, who must deal with an atmosphere of growing distrust and tension between their men.

None But the Brave

1965

Battle of the Japan Sea poster
6.4

Japan and Russia clash in what comes to be known as the Russo-Japanese War. An attempt by the Japanese fleet and army to take Port Arthur fails, and a Russian fleet bears down on the Sea of Japan. Admiral Heihachiro Togo sends his fleet to confront the Russians, with results which stun both nations. Meanwhile, Major Genjiro Akashi makes secret negotiations with the Bolshevik revolutionaries in Russia, negotiations that have repercussions far beyond the conflict at hand.

Battle of the Japan Sea

1969

Summer Soldiers poster
6.7

During the Vietnam War, an American G.I. deserts his base in Japan and escapes to Tokyo with the help of his Japanese bar hostess girlfriend. In the capital he gets involved with an anti-war organization while dodging the military police.

Summer Soldiers

1972

Japan Sinks poster
5.6

In the aftermath of a major earthquake, scientists predict that Japan will sink into the sea. As further disasters follow, politicians plead with other countries to take refugees, while scientists struggle to save Japan itself.

Japan Sinks

2006

Japan's Longest Day poster
7.3

Following the detonation of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese military and the government clash over the demand from the Allies for unconditional surrender. Minister of the Army Anami leads the military officers who propose to fight on, even to the death of every Japanese citizen. Emperor Hirohito, however, joins with his ministers in asking the unthinkable, the peaceful surrender of Japan. When the military plots a coup to overthrow the Emperor's civilian government, Anami must face the choice between his desires and loyalty to his Emperor.

Japan's Longest Day

1967

Kimagure tosei poster
NR

1962 Japanese movie

Kimagure tosei

1962

Battles Without Honor and Humanity poster
7.3

In the teeming black markets of postwar Japan, Shozo Hirono and his buddies find themselves in a new war between factious and ambitious yakuza.

Battles Without Honor and Humanity

1973

High Teen poster
NR

Terasaki, the new history teacher at the Senior High School, finds encouragement in the words of his Principal. "There are no bad children in this world. Some may be hard to handle but a teacher should never lose courage … never give up." But when put in charge of the third year class C, reputed to be the most incorrigible in the whole school, he is faced with surly opposition from the start. However, Terasaki perseveres. His greatest headaches are three students ... Sanae, who develops a "crush" on him, Nakanishi, who seeks to forget his unhappy home life in rugby, and Nire his pal.

High Teen

1959