is a Japanese

film director A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...

and

screenwriter A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based. ...

first known for his soft-core pornographic '' pink films'' of the 1990s. Along with fellow directors,

Kazuhiro Sano is a Japanese film director, screenwriter and actor best known for his '' pink films'' of the 1990s. Along with fellow directors, Takahisa Zeze, Toshiki Satō and Hisayasu Sato, he is known as one of the . Sano's films differ from those of o ...

Toshiki Satō a.k.a. , , ''and'' is a Japanese film director and screenwriter best known for his '' pink films'' of the 1990s. Along with fellow directors, Takahisa Zeze, Kazuhiro Sano and Hisayasu Satō, he is known as one of the . Life and career Toshiki ...

, and

Hisayasu Sato Hisayasu (written: 寿保 or 寿康) is a masculine Japanese given name. Notable people with the name include: *, Japanese politician *, Japanese film director {{given name Japanese masculine given names ...

, he is known as one of the . In recent years, he has directed such major commercial hits as '' 64: Part I'', '' 64: Part II'', and '' The 8-Year Engagement'', while continuing to make independent art films like ''

Heaven's Story is a 2010 Japanese film directed by Takahisa Zeze. It was screened in the Main Programme of the Forum section at the 61st Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the FIPRESCI Prize. It has also won the Séquences Prize at the Fantasia I ...

'' and ''

The Chrysanthemum and the Guillotine ''The Chrysanthemum and the Guillotine'' is a 2018 film directed by Takahisa Zeze about women's sumo wrestling and anarchism after the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake. The film won the Busan Film Festival's Bright East Films Award while in produc ...

''.

Life and career

"I try to show relationships, I make films about love. It's not just about the act of having sex, but what leads up to it and what comes after. What are the feelings of the people before, while they do it and after they did it? It's this development that interests me. I don't care very much about rape, because it's very one-sided and doesn't allow for this kind of development... I don't want to depict characters as having sex, but as making love."
-- Takahisa ZezeZeze, Takahisa quoted in

Takahisa Zeze was born in 1960 and graduated from

Kyoto University , mottoeng = Freedom of academic culture , established = , type = National university, Public (National) , endowment = ¥ 316 billion (2.4 1000000000 (number), billion USD) , faculty = 3,480 (Teaching Staff) , administrative_staff ...

in 1986. While attending this prestigious university, Zeze began making experimental films. He began his career in the film industry working for Shishi Productions as a

and

assistant director The role of an assistant director on a film includes tracking daily progress against the filming production schedule, arranging logistics, preparing daily call sheets, checking cast and crew, and maintaining order on the set. They also have to tak ...

for various '' pink film'' directors, including

Hisayasu Satō is a Japanese exploitation film director. He has worked prolifically in the genre of '' pinku eiga'' films, which refers to Japanese films that prominently feature nudity or sexual content. His best-known works are the 1992 pink film ''The Bedr ...

. Zeze usually writes the scripts for his films, which often contain examinations of social concerns not usually found in the ''pink film'' genre. His style is much less violent than Sato's, and rarely includes rape, one of the traditional thematic staples of the ''pink film'' from earliest times. Zeze also engages in more satire and self-conscious humor than is typical in the genre. He has the habit of giving his films eccentric titles during their production which the studios replace with a more commercially exploitable name before release. For example, Zeze's title ''My Existence Is a Phenomenon Based on the Hypothesis of Blue Light Generated by Organic Currency'' was changed to ''Amazon Garden: Uniform Lesbians''. He sometimes uses whimsical pseudonyms in his directorial credit, such as "Jean-Luc Zeze" or "South Pole #1". After a decade of making ''pink films'', Zeze turned to mainstream releases in 1997 with ''Kokkuri''. While continuing to work in the ''pink film'' genre, he has since directed several mainstream successes such as ''Rush!'', ''Hysteric'' and ''Dog Star''. In 2002 Zeze was honored with a career retrospective at Italy's Far East Film Festival. He often works with the cinematographer Kōichi Saitō.

Partial filmography

References

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External links

* , - ! colspan="3" style="background: #DAA520;" ,

Pink Grand Prix The or is an annual Japanese film award ceremony which recognizes excellence in the pink film genre. Referred to by Miho Toda as the "Academy Awards of the Pink Film", the ceremony attracts a diverse audience of industry personnel, film scholar ...

, - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Zeze, Takahisa 1960 births Japanese film directors Pink film directors Japanese screenwriters Living people Kyoto University alumni