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- Name Teruo Ishii
- Japanese: 石井輝男（いしい てるお)
- Birthdate: January 1, 1924 - August 12, 2005
- Birthplace: Tokyo, Japan
Bio
Teruo Ishii was born on January 1st in 1924 in Tokyo. In 1961, he made a contract with Toei after the bankruptcy of his former contracting film company, Shin-Toho. His first film with the new company, New Tokyo Toei, was “Hana to Arashi to Gang” and the leading actor was Ken Takakura (Black Rain, Mr. Baseball). Ishii played a role in changing the whole image of Toei’s unrefined action movies to a refined modern image. In 1965, he wrote and directed “Abashiri Bangaichi”. In these movie sequels, Ken Takakura became a big star singing the theme song and making it a great hit. Ishii directed the first ten films out of 18 movie sequels and had a significant influence on Takakura. Takakura claims that Ishii was his mentor and teacher and helped his growth as an actor.
In the 70s, Ishii directed comedic kung-fu movies, such as “Chokugeki! Jigokuken” (1974) and “Chokugeki! Jigokuken Daigyakuten” (1974) with the actor Sonny Chiba. These films were extremely successful and had a huge impact on Hong Kong action movies.
In 1979, Ishii made his last film “Boryoku Senshi” and then left the film industry. In 1981, he started to direct a large number of television programs.
During the 90s, when his abnormal sexual cult films such as “Kyofu Kikei Ningen” (1969) started to be shown in traditional cinema houses, his reputation and popularity boosted up among the young
as the “King of Cult”.
In 1993, after 14 years, Ishii returned to the theatrical film industry and directed “Gensenkan Shujin” whose original story was written by Yoshiharu Tsuge. Since “Gensenkan Shujin”, Ishii uses Tsuge brothers’ stories for his movies such as “Burai Heiya” (1995) and “Screwed” (1998). Since his return to film, Ishii has been vigorously creating more and more movies such as “Hell” (1999) and “Moju VS. Issunboushi” (2001).
On August 12, 2005 Teruo Ishii died of Lung Cancer at the age of 81.
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