
Acting
Feb 28, 1933
Tokyo, Japan
Yōko Minamida
Acting
Biography
Yōko Minamida (南田 洋子, Minamida Yōko, March 1, 1933 – October 21, 2009) was a Japanese actress. Born in Tokyo, Minamida made her screen debut in 1953 for the Daiei studio and quickly rose to stardom, working with Kenji Mizoguchi on two films: “A Story from Chikamatsu” and “Princess Yang Kwei-fei.” In 1955, she moved to the Nikkatsu studio, where she starred in Takumi Furukawa’s “Season of the Sun” (1956), a smash hit that launched the so-called “Sun Tribe” boom for films about rebellious youth looking for sex and kicks on Shonan Beach — Japan’s nearest equivalent to Malibu. Minamida acted in dozens of movies for Nikkatsu, working with Shohei Imamura, Seijun Suzuki, and other directors. In 1961 she married her co-star on “Season of the Sun,” Hiroyuki Nagato. As she acted in fewer movies after the mid-1960s, Minamida made a smooth and successful transition to TV as both an actress and MC. She also continued to appear occasionally in movies, with the last being Nobuhiko Obayashi’s “Song of Goodbye” in 2006. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in November 2008, and a TV documentary was made about her condition and the efforts of her husband to care for her. She died in Tokyo.
Feature Films (137)

In the city of Yokosuka, Kinta and his lover Haruko, both involved with yakuza, brave the post-occupation period with a goal to be together.
Pigs and Battleships

Tajima Yumi, in grade school, is overjoyed when her father says they are moving to an apartment in a big city. But the beautiful home she had imagined is in a slum area called Samurai Village, a little settlement, where people live from hand to mouth. To make things worse, a group of vagrants descends on the already crowded ragpickers' village. The sight depresses and saddens little Yumi, but when her father gives up drinking, it makes up for everything in her eyes, and when he runs past liquor shops to avoid temptation, Yumi's laughter rings out merrily again. A unique social drama depicting the growth of a new generation that confronts the world of adults full of vanity in the image of a girl living in poverty.
A Modern Samurai Village

When the wife of a 17th-century Kyoto scrollmaker is falsely accused of having an affair with his best employee, the pair flee the city and find themselves truly falling for one another.
Chikamatsu Monogatari

Akiko Yasutomi, an 18-year-old high school student, lives in poverty with her mother Hisako, but she has feelings for her cousin, a medical student named Masato Miki, who lives upstairs. However, when Masato becomes a part-time tutor for Akiko's classmate, Natsuko Shigeno, and Akiko becomes close to Natsuko, Akiko feels lonely. These feelings also help her to lose her purity to Junichi Yoda, whom she met by chance through an accidental mistake.
Zoku jūdai no seiten

Based on the manga by Sadao Jouji which has been running in the magazine Shukan Gendai since 1969.
Salaryman Senka

In 8th-century China, the Emperor grieves the death of his wife. The Yang family wants to provide the Emperor with a consort so that they may consolidate their court influence. General An Lushan finds a distant relative working in their kitchen, whom they groom to present to the Emperor. The Emperor falls in love and she becomes the Princess Yang Kwei-fei. The Yangs are then appointed important ministers, though An Lushan is not given the court position he covets.
Princess Yang Kwei-fei

Saheji, a man-about-town, gets stuck at a high-class brothel when he can’t pay the bill. He makes the best of his situation by performing various tasks amidst the tumult of the end of the shogunate—but always by making sure to get a “commission” for his troubles.
A Sun-Tribe Myth from the Bakumatsu Era
Television & Series (8)

Mika, a prodigy ballerina, gave up her ballet career when she tore her Achilles tendon. Later, at the suggestion of Shoko, an acquaintance of her father's, Mika joins a swimming club where Shoko teaches synchronized swimming, but Mika is traumatized by an incident in her childhood and has a phobia of water. She is also bullied by Ryoko, the daughter of the owner and a top synchronized swimmer, and by her classmates out of jealousy. However, under Shoko's strict but enthusiastic guidance, Mika eventually overcomes her fear of water and her talent blossoms...
Tears of a Swan

A struggling Korean veteran comes to terms with the fact that he is actually a caterpillar. I just made this up.
Yôi don

Starring Yōko Minamida as a woman who supported her family during and after World War II. All episodes are missing from the NHK archives, though a brief clip does survive as part of a contemporary news segment documenting the drama's production.
Niji

Kuki Shoichiro is relieved of his position as general manager of Gendai Shobo and transferred to the research office. One day, three months after his sudden relocation, on the night of a lecture at the Culture Center at Kinugawa's request, Hisaki meets Rinko Matsubara through his introduction. The story begins a few months later, in September, in a hotel room in Kamakura.
Lost Paradise

A track and field athlete falls in love with a cop. After being paralyzed by a bullet from a detective investigating her father's crimes, a high school sprinter finds unexpected love and navigates a web of family secrets and forbidden love.








