Keiichi Sakurai
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I actually entered Toho Studios in order to create Godzilla movies. This was the whole reason why I joined the company. Back then we had a specialized special effects cinematography team that worked just on these type of movies and at one point that team kind of fell apart, it went away. I am the last special effects cinematographer for Toho Studios.
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— Keiichi Sakurai, paraphrased from an interview with Famous Monsters TV |
Keiichi Sakurai (桜井 景一 is a Sakurai Keiichi)Japanese cinematographer. A lifelong fan of tokusatsu, he entered the genre as an assistant on the 1973 television series Zone Fighter, and was initially tasked with disguising the piano wires used to hold up scale models.[2][1] He joined Toho Eizo thereafter and participated in several of the company's subsequent special effects productions, including 1974's Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, for which he was a member of both the drama and effects crews.[1] In the 1990s, Sakurai served as a tertiary cameraman on three of the Heisei Godzilla films[2] before finally receiving billing as a cinematographer on Rebirth of Mothra 3. Sakurai has continued to shoot special effects for films and TV, and is a frequent collaborator of Shinji Higuchi.
Selected filmography
Assistant special effects cinematographer
- Zone Fighter (TV 1973) [approximately episodes 4-10, 12-26; uncredited][1][2]
- Submersion of Japan (1973) [uncredited][3]
- Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974) [uncredited][1][note 1]
- Prophecies of Nostradamus (1974) [uncredited][4]
- Submersion of Japan: Television Series (TV 1974-1975) [unknown number of episodes; uncredited][1]
- The War in Space (1977) [uncredited][5]
- Magnitude 7.9 (1980) [uncredited][6]
- Bye-Bye Jupiter (1984)
- Orochi, the Eight-Headed Dragon (1994)
Cinematographer
- Toho Unused Special Effects Complete Collection (VHS 1986) [with Fujio Okawa]
- Kawaii! JeNny (TV 2007)
- Go! Godman (2008)
- The God of Clay (2011) [with Takehiro Kuramochi]
- A Giant Warrior Descends on Tokyo (2012) [with Keizo Suzuki]
- Dream Challenge: Godzilla Appears in Sukagawa (2019)
Special effects cinematographer
- Mikadoroid (1991) [with Toshimitsu Oneda]
- Rebirth of Mothra 3 (1998) [with Kenichi Eguchi]
- The Gransazers (TV 2003-2004)
- The Gransazers: Official Super Mecha Video (video 2003)
- The Justirisers (TV 2004-2005)
- Super Fleet Sazer-X (TV 2005-2006)
- Super Fleet Sazer-X the Movie (2005)
- Monster Magnitude: 9 (TV 2010)
- Attack on Titan the Movie: Part 1 (2015) [with Keizo Suzuki]
- Attack on Titan the Movie: Part 2 (2015) [with Keizo Suzuki]
- Shin Godzilla (2016) [with Keizo Suzuki]
- Godzilla vs. the Tigers (2022)
Associate cinematographer
- Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)
- Godzilla vs. Mothra (1992)
- Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993)
Miscellaneous
- Orochi: Strikes Again (1985) - Equipment cooperation
Trivia[2]
- Sakurai considers Submersion of Japan to be his favorite film that he worked on, and Super Fleet Sazer-X the Movie to be his best work as a cameraman.
- Sakurai saw his first tokusatsu movie, 1957's The Mysterians, while in the first grade. The first Godzilla movie he saw was 1962's King Kong vs. Godzilla.
- He would later credit The Mysterians with sparking his interest in tokusatsu, and motivating him to pursue a career in it. The movie was similarly influential for special effects director Koichi Kawakita.
- Sakurai was initially disappointed with Godzilla's "cute" appearance in Godzilla vs. Megalon, as his perception of the character had been shaped by the "scary-looking" suit from King Kong vs. Godzilla.
- While in high school, Sakurai wrote a letter to prolific effects director Eiji Tsuburaya asking for help getting into making kaiju movies, and received a response advising him to first attend university.
External links
Notes
References
This is a list of references for Keiichi Sakurai. 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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Bibliography
- Nakamura, Satoshi; Shiraishi, Masahiko; Aita, Tetsuo; Tomoi, Taketo; Shimazaki, Jun; Maruyama, Takeshi; Shimizu, Toshifumi; Hayakawa, Masaru (29 November 2014). Godzilla Toho Champion Festival Perfection. ASCII MEDIA WORKS. ISBN 978-4-04-866999-3.
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