Japan, Theater, Movies, Film, Cinema 

More than in most countries, the movies in Japan reflect the nation and its people as they really are. From that day in 1894 when Japanese royalty was shown its first film, the motion picture in Japan has had a distinctively Japanese flavor. The movies' popularity quickly spread and the cinema became one of Japan's major industries. At the same time it also turned into one of Japan's most typical and revealing arts. Films such as Ugetsu, Tokyo Story, and Kagemusha have been seen all over the world, creating an international audience for this latest and most exciting art.
Here, in this completely updated edition of one of the most informative books ever written on Japanese cinema, is the story of how Japanese film became what it is, why it succeeded in so catching the essence of the country, and what it is in the Japanese picture that is meaningful to the rest of the world-a story about pictures, in pictures.
The author, the recognized foremost critic and historian of the Japanese cinema, has selected the best from his vast and valuable collection of still photographs, many given him by the directors themselves and many reproduced here for the first time. He has supplemented the illustrations with a thoughtful commentary that not only provides interesting comparisons between the films of Japan and those of other countries, but is also a penetrating analysis of how Japan's movies have reflected the great social and psychological changes of the nation that produced them.
For anyone interested in film, and especially for those who wish to gain new insights into Japanese film and into Japan itself, this is a book of lasting and permanent interest. - from Amzon