Machiko Kyo Filmography

Born:: March 25, 1924 in Osaka, Japan
Occupation:: Actor
Biography:: Brought to films in 1949 on the strength of her beauty and dancing skills, Machiko Kyo unexpectedly proved to be an actress of unusual power and intensity. Only 18 years old when she burst onto the international film scene as the humiliated wife in Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon (1953), she followed...Read More

Sort By:
Title
Release Date

Kurosawa

Actors: Sam Shepard, Paul Scofield, James Coburn, Clint Eastwood, Shinobu Hashimoto

Synopsis: Akira Kurosawa was arguably the most important Japanese filmmaker who ever lived; he was certainly among the most revered and most influential. His award-winning feature Rashomon was one of the first major international successes in Japanese filmmaking, convincing many western cineastes for the Read More

2001
Kesho

Actors: Keiko Matsuzaka, Machiko Kyo

1985
Thousand Cranes

Synopsis: This drama is based on Kawabata's Nobel Prize-winning autobiographical novel about the two loves of his father and about the anger he feels toward them. When he was a boy he meets the first lover with whom his father only had a brief affair. Later, the philanderer gets involved with a widow. Read More

1969
The Daphne

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Haruko Sugimura, Reiko Dan, Yuriko Hoshi

Synopsis: The Daphne refers to Hariko Sugimura, a widow with four daughters. Two of the girls still live at home; the other two are married, with lives of their own. The film chronicles the shifting-sand relationship between mother and daughters, with happiness and heartbreak coming out even. The cast of Read More

1966
The Face of Another

Actors: Tatsuya Nakadai, Machiko Kyo, Kyoko Kishida, Eiji Okada, Mikijiro Hira

Synopsis: Bearing traces of both Frankenstein and the 1959 Georges Franju horror classic Eyes without a Face, the Japanese The Face of Another is a disturbing Japanese drama featuring Tatsuya Nakadai. His face horribly disfigured in an accident, Nakadai, a wealthy industrialist, commissions a special mask Read More

1966
The Great Wall

Actors: Shintaro Katsu, Fujiko Yamamoto, Ken Utsui, Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Ayako Wakao

Synopsis: In this Japanese historical epic, set 230 B.C. China, a tyrannical conqueror tries to bring all of China's warring tribes together. He marries a woman whose father he murdered. She later tries to exact revenge by killing him. Later, his enemies attempt to assassinate him, but they fail and kill Read More

1965
Shaka

Actors: Kojiro Hongo, Charito Solis, Shintaro Katsu, Machiko Kyo, Raizo Ichikawa

Synopsis: An Indian prince leaves his world of comfort and riches behind to wander and meditate for six years in search of spiritual enlightenment. Siddartha (Cojoin Hong) turns his back on the old religion when people are starving needlessly and holy rituals include human sacrifices. During his Read More

1961
Jokyo

Actors: Ayako Wakao, Fujiko Yamamoto, Machiko Kyo

1960
Bonchi

Actors: Raizo Ichikawa, Isuzu Yamada, Kikue Mori, Machiko Kyo, Ayako Wakao

Synopsis: Although shown at Japan House in 1981, Bonchi was first released in Japan in 1960 as an attack, with and without humor, on the beginnings of the feminist movement. The story centers around a family's merchant business that has been handed down from mother to daughter, but the daughter has an only Read More

1960
Sayonara, Konnichiwa

1959
Odd Obsession

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Ganjiro Nakamura, Junko Kano, Tatsuya Nakadai, Tanie Kitabayashi

Synopsis: Several cinematic variations on Junichiro Tanizaki's novel about jealousy, voyeurism, and sexual arousal began with this award-winning drama by director Kon Ichikawa. Kenji Kenmochi (Ganjiro Nakamura) is the older and increasingly impotent husband of young Ikuko (Machiko Kyo). He is desperate to Read More

1959
Floating Weeds

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Ganjiro Nakamura, Haruko Sugimura, Hiroshi Kawaguchi

Synopsis: This 1959 Ozu production centers on the likable but fallible leader of an itinerant acting troupe ("floating weeds" being the Japanese name for such groups), Kimajuro, played brilliantly by Ganjiro Nakamura. The film opens on a lazy, stagnant river as the troupe lays spread about on a boat deck Read More

1959
Ana

1957
The Teahouse of the August Moon

Actors: Marlon Brando, Glenn Ford, Machiko Kyo, Eddie Albert, Paul Ford

Synopsis: Marlon Brando went out on yet another creative limb when he insisted upon playing sly, philosophical Okinawan interpreter Sakima in the 1956 filmization of John Patrick's Broadway play Teahouse of the August Moon. While he occasionally lapses into "flied lice" stereotyping, for the most part Read More

1956
Street of Shame

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Aiko Mimasu

Synopsis: Kenji Mizoguchi's final film was on one of his favorite subjects: prostitutes. After a spate of universally lauded period pieces, Mizoguchi returned to the socially conscious dramas that he made famous in the 1930s. Here, as in Osaka Elegy (1936), he offered a scathing critique of society's Read More

1956
Princess Yang Kwei Fei

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Masayuki Mori

Synopsis: Japanese director Kenji Mizoguchi directed Princess Yang Kwei Fei. When first we see her, the "princess" (Machiko Kyo) is a mere servant girl. The reigning princess dies, and the emperor chooses the servant as his wife. Jealousy and back-stabbing doom this union from the start. Mizoguchi Read More

1955
Gate of Hell

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Kazuo Hasegawa, Isao Yamagata, Koreya Senda, Yataro Kurokawa

Synopsis: Originally released as Jigokumen, Gate of Hell was one of the most popular Japanese imports of the 1954-55 American film season. Set in 12th-century feudal Japan, the film stars Kazuo Hasegawa as Moritoh, a samurai whose courage in defending his ruler is to be rewarded with anything he desires. He Read More

1953
Ugetsu Monogatari

Actors: Machiko Kyo, Masayuki Mori, Kinuyo Tanaka, Sakae Ozawa, Mitsuko Mito

Synopsis: Presented in a manner as eerie as it is heartbreaking, this film is a gorgeous supernatural fable about the folly of men with dreams larger than their abilities and their women who suffer as a result. Genjuro (Masuyaki Mori) is a potter who longs for wealth and luxury, while Tobei (Sakae Ozawa), a Read More

1953
Ani Imoto

1953
Genji Monogatari

Actors: Kazuo Hasegawa, Michiyo Kogure, Machiko Kyo, Mitsuko Mito, Nobuko Otowa

Synopsis: Genji Monogatori (A Tale of Genji) was another copacetic collaboration between Japanese director Kosaburo Yoshimura and screenwriter Kaneto Shindo. Based on a long-popular novel by Murasaki Shikibu, the film stars Kazuo Hasegawa as Genji, the illegitimate offspring of a Japanese potentate. Read More

1952
Bizyo to Tozoku

Actors: Machiko Kyo

Synopsis: Many of the production personnel responsible for the Japanese classic Rashomon also worked on Bizyo to Tozoka. Released in the U.S. as Beauty and the Thieves, the film was adapted from an 11th-century Kabuki drama. Actress Machiko Kyo plays the leader of a female outlaw gang who rob from the rich Read More

1952
Rashomon

Actors: Toshiro Mifune, Masayuki Mori, Machiko Kyo, Takashi Shimura, Minoru Chiaki

Synopsis: This landmark film is a brilliant exploration of truth and human weakness. It opens with a priest, a woodcutter, and a peasant taking refuge from a downpour beneath a ruined gate in 12th-century Japan. The priest and the woodcutter, each looking stricken, discuss the trial of a notorious bandit Read More

1951