Uchida Tomu’s filmography spans two great filmmaking periods separated by a 15-year hiatus due to the war, although his output of primarily genre films and lack of an immediately obvious signature style has meant that he has been overshadowed by contemporaries such as Ozu Yasujirô, Naruse Mikio, and Mizoguchi Kenji.

Born in Okayama prefecture in western Japan, Uchida entered the film industry as an actor, moving to Yokohama in the early 1920s, where he appeared in a number of works produced by the Taikatsu company, including its first film, Amateur Club (Amachua kurabu, 1920), directed by Thomas Kurihara (see PURE FILM MOVEMENT; TANIZAKI JUNICHIRÔ), and other productions, including many for Makino Shôzô’s company. Following a brief period immediately after the 1923 Great Kantô Earthquake working as an itinerant performer, he returned to Nikkatsu’s studios in Tokyo. Codirecting and production credits on several films during this early period, including one for an early silhouette (kagi-e) animation codirected with Okuda Hidehiko, Crab Temple Omen (Kani manji engi, 1925), point to Uchida’s increasingly active role behind the camera, and in 1927 he made his feature directing debut with Three Days of Competition (Kyôsô mikkakan). Very little of Uchida’s output of around 40 titles made in the prewar period survives, although at the time his films were noted for containing strong leftwing sympathies, common to many who began in the industry during its first great flourish in the 1920s.

(Source: Historical Dictionary of Japanese Cinema - Jasper Sharp) Edit Biography