Acting

Tanie Kitabayashi

Born May 21, 1911 · Tokyo, Japan

Died April 27, 2010 · aged 98

Tanie Kitabayashi (北林谷栄, Kitabayashi Tanie, May 21, 1911 – April 27, 2010) was a Japanese actress and voice actress. Born Reiko Ando in Tokyo, she began as a stage actress. Early in her career, she became well known for portraying older women. Kitabayashi was a founding member of the famed Mingei Theatre, founded in 1950. In 1960, she won best actress awards at the 10th Blue Ribbon Awards and at t…

Known For

My Neighbor Totoro

My Neighbor Totoro · 1988

My Neighbor Totoro

MovieFantasyAnimation

Two sisters move to the country with their father in order to be closer to their hospitalized mother, and discover the surrounding trees are inhabited by Totoros, magical spirits of the forest. When the youngest runs away from home, the older sister seeks help from the spirits to find her.

My Son's Revolt

My Son's Revolt · 1958

My Son's Revolt

A coming-of-age film.

Stakeout

Stakeout · 1958

MovieCrimeDrama

Two detectives begin a stakeout based on the slim chance of catching a murderer whom they suspect will try to reunite with an old flame.

Tale of Japanese Burglars

Tale of Japanese Burglars · 1965

Tale of Japanese Burglars

MovieCrimeComedy

Gisuke Hayashida is an illegal dentist during the day and a burglar by night. One night during a burglary he witnesses a train derailment. Some communists are found guilty of causing the incident, but he knows it wasn't them. He can save innocent people but for that he must confess his own crime.

Learn from Experience, Part Two

Learn from Experience, Part Two · 1937

Learn from Experience, Part Two

Toyomi is pregnant -- and while Shintaro and Yurie are on their extended honeymoon, she bears his child, a girl named Kiyoko. She is supported in adversity by close friend Michiko and her mother but also, surprisingly, Shintaro's mother and siblings. Even moreso, Toyomi and Yurie become friends. Part two of a two-part romance based on a story by noted author Kikuchi Kan.

Rikyu

Late in the 1500s, an aging tea master teaches the way of tea to a headstrong Shogun. Through force of will and courageous fighting, Hideyoshi becomes Japan’s most powerful warlord, unifying the country.

Station

Station · 1981

MovieDramaThriller

A detective goes out of his way to crack the case of a serial killer who specialises in murdering police officers.

The Burmese Harp

The Burmese Harp · 1956

The Burmese Harp

In Burma during the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier separated from his unit disguises himself as a Buddhist monk to escape imprisonment as a POW.

Filmography

Sort

My Neighbor Totoro

My Neighbor Totoro · 1988

My Neighbor Totoro

MovieFantasyAnimation

Two sisters move to the country with their father in order to be closer to their hospitalized mother, and discover the surrounding trees are inhabited by Totoros, magical spirits of the forest. When the youngest runs away from home, the older sister seeks help from the spirits to find her.

Granny (voice)

My Son's Revolt

My Son's Revolt · 1958

My Son's Revolt

A coming-of-age film.

Stakeout

Stakeout · 1958

MovieCrimeDrama

Two detectives begin a stakeout based on the slim chance of catching a murderer whom they suspect will try to reunite with an old flame.

Tale of Japanese Burglars

Tale of Japanese Burglars · 1965

Tale of Japanese Burglars

MovieCrimeComedy

Gisuke Hayashida is an illegal dentist during the day and a burglar by night. One night during a burglary he witnesses a train derailment. Some communists are found guilty of causing the incident, but he knows it wasn't them. He can save innocent people but for that he must confess his own crime.

Hayashida's mother

Learn from Experience, Part Two

Learn from Experience, Part Two · 1937

Learn from Experience, Part Two

Toyomi is pregnant -- and while Shintaro and Yurie are on their extended honeymoon, she bears his child, a girl named Kiyoko. She is supported in adversity by close friend Michiko and her mother but also, surprisingly, Shintaro's mother and siblings. Even moreso, Toyomi and Yurie become friends. Part two of a two-part romance based on a story by noted author Kikuchi Kan.

Rikyu

Late in the 1500s, an aging tea master teaches the way of tea to a headstrong Shogun. Through force of will and courageous fighting, Hideyoshi becomes Japan’s most powerful warlord, unifying the country.

Mother

Station

Station · 1981

MovieDramaThriller

A detective goes out of his way to crack the case of a serial killer who specialises in murdering police officers.

Masayo Mikami

The Burmese Harp

The Burmese Harp · 1956

The Burmese Harp

In Burma during the closing days of WWII, a Japanese soldier separated from his unit disguises himself as a Buddhist monk to escape imprisonment as a POW.

Yomigaeri

Yomigaeri · 2003

MovieFantasyDrama

When dead people starts returning to the small Japanese town of Aso, government official Kawada is dispatched to uncover the “truth”.

Saki Naito

Amagi Pass

Amagi Pass · 1983

MovieCrimeFantasy

Japan in the 1940s. A high school boy went into a magic encounter with Ozuka Hana, a geisha (pub-girl) when he traveled through Amagi Pass. A mysterious murder took place afterwards, an Ozuka was held responsible. 40 years later, the boy, who became a printing shop owner, was visited by a retired policeman who came from Amagi Pass. The truth then started to reveal itself.

Tea house's old woman

White Snake Enchantment

White Snake Enchantment · 1983

White Snake Enchantment

Uta married a priest who saved her when she tried to commit suicide at a waterfall. The love triangle between a lustful priest, his second wife and his son Masao.

Tane

Dawn Chorus

Dawn Chorus · 1955

An innocent bus girl who gave up on getting into a women’s college and is now filled with new hope and the cheerful, slightly flirtatious young man who loves her, inside the car on a stormy night...

A Japanese Tragedy

A Japanese Tragedy · 1953

A Japanese Tragedy

At the close of the war in Japan, a widowed mother makes every possible sacrifice to bring up her ungrateful son and daughter who are unimpressed with their poor standard of living at home. They gradually reject her in search of the material comforts that working as a maid cannot provide. The mother's despair becomes interminable.

Ichizo's wife

The Insect Woman

The Insect Woman · 1963

The Insect Woman

A woman, Tome, is born to a lower class family in Japan in 1918. The title refers to an insect, repeating its mistakes, as in an infinite circle. Imamura, with this metaphor, introduces the life of Tome, who keeps trying to change her poor life.

Madam

Love: Starting on a Journey

Love: Starting on a Journey · 1985

Love: Starting on a Journey

MovieFantasyMystery

A girl suffering from an incurable disease get in a coma, while her boyfriend visit her to the hospital, she visits the beyond.

Wrath of Daimajin

Wrath of Daimajin · 1966

Wrath of Daimajin

MovieFantasyHorror

In a mountainous region of Japan, Lord Arakawa kidnaps the men of nearby villages to use as slave labor, producing gunpowder from his sulfur pits. A band of young boys decide to rescue their enslaved fathers on their own.

Old Woman Kane

Scandal

Scandal · 1950

A celebrity photograph sparks a court case as a tabloid magazine spins a scandalous yarn over a painter and a famous singer.

Yasu Hiruta

Inhibited Love

Inhibited Love · 1955

Chieko Izumi is a reporter for the magazine "Weekly Japanese Women". She had come to Tokyo to stay with her aunt in order to escape her stubborn grandmother in her hometown in Kyushu, who was trying to force her to marry Komori, the local ringleader.

Intentions of Murder

Intentions of Murder · 1964

Intentions of Murder

The neglected common-law wife of a Japanese librarian is repeatedly harassed by a young man with a heart condition who seduces her with the prospect of a better life.

Kinu Takahashi

A Girl Who Delivers Happiness

A Girl Who Delivers Happiness · 1955

A Girl Who Delivers Happiness

Odd Obsession

Odd Obsession · 1959

MovieDramaComedy

A middle-aged husband of a younger woman finds her youth intimidating to the point that he cannot become aroused. His solution involves the introduction of his daughter's lover to his wife.

Hana

Proof of the Man

Proof of the Man · 1977

Proof of the Man

MovieDramaCrime

When an American is murdered in a Japanese inn, Tokyo police detective Munesue follows the trail of the killer to New York. There he is joined by a New York City detective named Shuftan and together they sort out the crime.

The Human Bullet

The Human Bullet · 1968

The Human Bullet

MovieComedyDrama

A soldier has been in the Japanese military for the entirety of WWII, and in that time, his dedication to the army has never faltered. However, as the war draws to a close, his commanding officers become increasingly desperate and push their men to ever more absurd extremes. The ridiculousness of the orders from above peak when the hero of the story is assigned to drive a one-man submarine straight into the hull of an enemy battleship.

Bookstore Owner's Wife

Kamishibai Showa History: The Golden Bat is Here

Kamishibai Showa History: The Golden Bat is Here · 1972

Kamishibai Showa History: The Golden Bat is Here

MovieComedyFantasy

The dramatized tale of the 1935 creation of Japan's first superhero, the "Golden Bat", alongside the changes during and after the Second World War, not just to the hero himself, but the art of "kamishibai" picture stories that he originated from.

Mayuko hitori

Mayuko hitori · 1971

Kano is known as a "cocoon child" whose father is an agriculturist. Her mother disappeared when she was little and since then Kano has been wondering why her mother left her thus changing the shape of her life.

加野のぶ

おくさまは18歳

おくさまは18歳 · 1970

おくさまは18歳

SeriesComedyDrama

Asuka's grandmother