Shûe Matsubayashi

After starting at Toho in 1942, Matsubayashi's career, like that of so many others, was stalled by the Second World War. After serving in the Imperial Navy, to which he was fiercely loyal, Matsubayashi returned to the industry via the Shintoho studio in 1946. Shintoho gave him his first directorial job, Tokyo Dimples, in 1952. After returning to Toho in 1955, Matsubayashi specialized in salaryman comedies such as the Shacho (Boss) series. He directed more of that series (23 entries) than any other filmmaker. Due to Matsubayashi's wartime patriotism, greater than that of many of his contemporaries, Toho often entrusted him with their big-budget, special effects-laden war pictures from the 1960s up through the early 1980s. His best known movie outside Japan is probably Sekai Daisenso (aka The Last War, 1961).