I was deeply saddened to hear that legendary anime director Eiichi Yamamoto passed away recently. One of the amazing pioneers of anime, it is hard to overstate how important Eiichi Yamamoto was to the medium. Therefore, I thought it worth taking a look at who he was, his body of work and how his legacy has helped to shape modern anime.
After Eiichi Yamamoto graduated from high school, he joined Otogi Pro, a company established by mangaka Ryuichi Yokoyama to experiment with animation. It wasn’t long afterwards that Osamu Tezuka established a new animation studio called “Mushi Production” and Eiichi Yamamoto ended up joining the company. He would go on to be heavily involved with the new studio’s two initial offerings, the experimental short film “Tales of a Street Corner” and the television series “Astro Boy”, arguably the most important anime series of all time!
Soon afterwards, he would direct both Kimba the White Lion, named Jungle Emperor in Japanese, TV series, notable for being the first television anime in colour rather than in black and white, and the Kimba the While Lion theatrical animated film. He would also direct another TV anime series for Mushi Production in 1973 called Wansa-kun.
However, the reason why I was familiar with Eiichi Yamamoto prior to his death was his work on the Animerama trilogy. Intended to push the envelope of what anime could be by combining experimental animation with erotic content, in order to cash-in on the rising popularity of pink films, while adapting historical tales. While the brainchild of Osamu Tezuka, it was actually Eiichi Yamamoto who would direct the trilogy with only Cleopatra seeing Osamu Tezuka involved as co-director.
The first film, A Thousand and One Nights, was released in 1969 and adapts the literary classic of the same name. I’ve heard mixed reports on whether A Thousand and One Nights was a success at the Japanese box office or not. A year later, Cleopatra was released, telling the story of Cleopatra through a time travelling sci-fi lens. Cleopatra ended up becoming a box office bomb at a time when Mushi Production was already facing financial trouble. Later, in 1973, Eiichi Yamamoto released the final film of the trilogy, Belladonna of Sadness. The film had little to no involvement from Osamu Tezuka which allowed Eiichi Yamamoto more creative freedom than the previous two entries. Even with a paltry budget which resulted in the film having incredibly limited animation, the film was still a financial flop although it’s worth noting the film has received a lot of critical praise from modern critics.
After the fall of Mushi Production, Eiichi Yamamoto ended up working on the anime adaptations of Space Battleship Yamato, acting as a supervising director for the first season, writing screenplays for the series and film as well as co-directing the third season. He would continue to work throughout the 1980s, working on, Oshin, Odin: Starlight Mutiny, Final Yamato and writing the 1991 OVA The Sensualist. It wouldn’t be until 2019 when he returned to animation co-directing a short anime film named One Arm.
Eiichi Yamamoto was at the forefront of the advent of anime for television and his work on Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion laid the groundwork for modern anime series. Belladonna of Sadness is now considered to be a classic of animation while his work on Space Battleship Yamato helped lay the foundations for many sci-fi anime series such as Gundam, Evangelion etc. Let me know your thoughts on Eiichi Yamamoto: one of the amazing pioneers of anime, whether you’ve seen any of his works and, if you have, which you’ve enjoyed, your thoughts on the impact he has had on the anime industry and any additional information you might have on the topic.
Hopefully you have found this article interesting and informative and, if you wish to seek any of the works I mentioned, don’t hesitate to use amazon.co.uk and amazon.com for all of your needs!