Yasuji Murata

Sports Day at Animal Village. Japanese animation short.

An old man with a huge lump on his face encounters a band of Tengu in the mountains.

The story is based on the traditional, Japanese myth of Urashima Taro; in which a fisherman is transported from the seashore into a fantastic underwater world on the back of a giant turtle.

A train conductor goes about his duty. All the characters are animals in human form. Hippo ladies in dresses try to jam into cars and other passengers pull jokes and cause havoc.

A Yasuji Murata version of the classic Japanese story Saru Kani Gassen.

A group of animals take part in Olympic sports.

A miller and his son clumsily attempt to transport a donkey.

An adaptation of the The Ugly Duckling.

A group of animals want to end the violence of the wolf.

A duckling tries to save the animals when a storm hits their farm.

Momotaro takes to the ocean to fight a shark.

Kintaro, gentle and strong, is popular in the forest. He eventually becomes a great samurai with the name Sakata no Kintoki.

When copper wire is wrapped around an iron rod and connected to a battery, it becomes an electromagnet. A science teaching material movie that explains the principle and structure of electric bells and telephones by applying the principle of an electromagnet through a fusion of live action and animation.

Haru is a Japanese word that means spring (season). A lighthearted anime about spring time. It was originally set to an elementary school song. The film features several vignettes.

A man and his young son travel through the countryside to take their donkey to a horse auction. Unfortunately every person they pass has a different opinion on how this should be accomplished, leading to disastrous results when the dim-witted father abandons common sense in an attempt to please everyone.

During the late Kamakura period, there lived a famous swordsmith known as Masamune whose renown as a swordsmith was so great that even long after his passing the term “Masamune” was used to describe any fine sword. Even today, the Masamune Prize is awarded to swordsmiths of outstanding skills in their craft. In Yasuji Murata’s cutout animation The Monkey Masamune a humble messenger is rewarded with the gift of a Masamune sword when he saves the life of a monkey and her child.

A rare glimpse of early Japanese sound anime and prewar Japanese culture, The Roots of Japanese Anime features the masterworks of such pioneers of Japanese animation as Noburo Ofuji, Yasuji Murata, and Kenzo Masaoka, in addition to Mitsuyo Seo’s Momotaro’s Sea Eagle, the notorious war cartoon billed as Japan’s first feature anime. These movies represent the brilliance and variety of anime, ranging from beautiful Japanese paper animation to powerful multiplane cel cartoons. They also evoke the fascinating complexity of Japan, a nation that is then both marching towards war, enlisting kids in militarist nationalism, yet also delighting in a mixture of modern popular culture, ancient folk tales, irreverent comedy, and the everyday life of prewar Japanese children.

Animated short features bunnies and tanuki having wacky hijinks while going skiing.

Two girls were watching a street performer. The girls sang out loud and the performer brought them up front so that they could sing for the audience. (Source: MyAnimeList.net)

The lazy Tompei is still asleep past 10 o'clock and even at 11 o'clock. He finally wakes up at 12 o'clock at the deafening sound of the angry clock. Hungry, Tompei walks to Sarukichi's house and grabs food Sarukichi has harvested. The next day, while Sarukichi is working in the hills, Tompei beats Sarukichi's two children who are staying at home and tries to steal things from Sarukichi's house. Sarukichi, who is alerted of the situation via telephone from his children races home, is infuriated at the cruel Tompei and punches him so hard he falls down.

An adaptation of Aesop's fable The Ant and the Grasshopper but with a slight change. We have a diligent family ants versus a drunken lazy frog, a bourgeois butterfly and grasshopper couple. As winter comes, the frog, butterfly, and grasshopper are ill and starving.

A family of mice dance to entertain a cat that disrupted their festivities after returning home early. (Source: MyAnimeList.net)

Very early animated short from Japan featuring a cast of anthropomorphic animals.

Adaptation of Japanese fairy tale Hanasaka Jiisan.