Hitomi Nozoe (野添ひとみ, Nozoe Hitomi, 11 February 1937 – 4 May 1995) was a Japanese actress popular in the 1950s and early 1960s.
Hitomi Nozoe | |
|---|---|
 Hitome Nozoe in the 1950s | |
| Born | 11 February 1937 |
| Died | 4 May 1995 (aged 58) |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Spouse | |
Career
editNozoe first gained attention[1] in ingénue roles for Shochiku in films such as Kobayashi's Sincerity (1953), eventually joining Daiei following her appearance in 1955's national "New Faces" studio recruitment drive.[2] In 1960 she married frequent co-star Hiroshi Kawaguchi, son of writer and Daiei executive Matsutarō Kawaguchi, and both semi-retired from acting within a few years as Kawaguchi became a businessman and reality-TV adventurer.[3]
Known primarily for demure and innocent roles, Nozoe became a "sensation"[4] following her star-turn in Masumura's Giants and Toys (1958) as a vivacious tomboy transformed into an overnight celebrity as a confectionery spokesmodel. She is also well known in the West for her brief role as a barber's daughter in Ozu's widely acclaimed Floating Weeds (1959), which Roger Ebert named as one of the ten greatest films of all time.[5]
In 1988, the year after Kawaguchi's death at age 51 following a long illness with gastric and esophageal cancer, Nozoe published the memoir Hiroshi-san, I Did My Best (浩さん、がんばったね). She continued to write and lecture on the disease, succumbing to thyroid cancer in 1995 at age 58.[6]
Selected filmography
edit- Kisses (1957)
- Typhoon Over Nagasaki (1957)
- Giants and Toys (巨人と玩具, Kyojin to gangu) (1958)
- Floating Weeds (浮草, Ukigusa) ( (1959)
References
edit- ^ "New film reveals suffering of first Japanese Christmas". newspapers.com. The Brownsville Herald. 10 April 1956. Retrieved 16 April 2020.
- ^ Coates, Jennifer (2014). National crisis and the female image: expressions of trauma in Japanese film, 1945-64 (Thesis). doi:10.25501/SOAS.00020301. S2CID 143001228.
- ^ "Kyojin to gangu, Movie, 1958". IMCDb.org. Internet Movie Cars Database. Retrieved 16 April 2020.
- ^ "The Cruel Beauty Of Masumura Yasuzo" (PDF). jpf.org.uk. The Japan Foundation, London. Retrieved 16 April 2020.
- ^ Ebert, Roger (1 April 1991). "Ten Greatest Films of All Time". Roger Ebert. Retrieved 13 February 2017.
- ^ "Hitomi Nozoe". Kotobank (in Japanese). Asahi Shimbun Co., Ltd. Retrieved 16 April 2020.
External links
edit- Hitomi Nozoe at IMDb
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