Akira Watanabe
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Akira Watanabe (渡辺 明 Watanabe Akira), nicknamed Mr. Nabe (ナベさん Nabe-san), was a Japanese special effects production designer who worked frequently on Toho's tokusatsu films during the Showa era. He is notable for approving and finalizing the designs of popular monsters such as King Ghidorah, Baragon, and Godzilla himself. Watanabe joined Shochiku in 1929, but transferred to Toho in 1941 at the recommendation of special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya, and worked on his first film for the company the following year. He departed from Toho in 1966 after serving as Tsuburaya's production designer on Invasion of Astro-Monster. He co-founded Japanese Special Effects Productions (later Japanese Special Effects Film Co.), with which he became a special effects director in his own right, directing the effects for Nikkatsu's Gappa and the Japanese-American co-production The Green Slime.
Selected filmography
Special effects production designer
- Godzilla (1954)[a]
- Godzilla Raids Again (1955)[b]
- Half Human (1955)[c]
- Rodan (1956)[c]
- The Mysterians (1957)
- The H-Man (1958)
- Varan (1958)
- Monkey Sun (1959)
- The Three Treasures (1959)
- Battle in Outer Space (1959)
- The Secret of the Telegian (1960)
- The Human Vapor (1960)
- Mothra (1961)
- The Last War (1961)
- Gorath (1962)
- King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)
- Matango (1963)
- Atragon (1963)
- Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)
- Dogora (1964)
- Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964)
- Frankenstein vs. Baragon (1965)
- Invasion of Astro-Monster (1965)
- Ultra Q (TV 1966) [episodes 6, 8, 27]
Miscellaneous
- Gappa (1967) - Original story / director of special effects[d]
- The Green Slime (1968) - Director of special effects [with Yukio Manoda][e]
Gallery
Akira Watanabe and Keiko Sawai with a model of the P-1
Akira Watanabe on the set of Lady from Hell
Trivia
- The 2012 San Diego Comic-Con "mood piece" for Godzilla (2014) was first leaked to the internet by a YouTube user named "Akira Watanabe."[2]
- Another Akira Watanabe would later work as a lighting assistant on the 2024 short film Godzilla: Attack on Tokyo, though his name is spelled with different kanji.
Notes
- ↑ Special effects staff members' positions did not begin to be credited individually until The Mysterians in 1957. As such, Watanabe was credited for "special technology" alongside Eiji Tsuburaya, Hiroshi Mukoyama, and Kuichiro Kishida.
- ↑ Credited for "special technology" alongside Hiroshi Mukoyama and Masao Shirota; see first note.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Credited for "special technology" alongside Eiji Tsuburaya, Masao Shirota and Hiroshi Mukoyama; see first note.
- ↑ Credited as storywriter and "associate" in the Japanese version; credited as special effects director in the American version.
- ↑ Only credited in the American cut; Japanese Special Effects Film Co., Ltd. is credited in the Japanese version.
References
This is a list of references for Akira Watanabe. These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this: [1]
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