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GODZILLA – Akira Ifukube
GREATEST SCORES OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
Original Review by Craig Lysy
Toho studio producer Tomoyuki Tanaka was greatly impressed by the film The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953) and resolved to create a Japanese version. He penned his own script and pitched it to Toho Studio executive Iwao Mori, who signed off on the project. Renowned special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya was hired and affirmed that it was financially and technologically feasible to create the monster, suggesting the use suitmation (an actor in a costume suit) over stop motion animation. Ishirō Honda was given the reigns to direct the film and he selected a fine cast which included Akira Takarada as Captain Hideto Ogata, Momoko Kochi as Emiko Yamane, Akihiko Hirata as Daisuke Serizawa and Takashi Shimura as Dr. Kyohei Yamane. The screenplay underwent several incarnations, evolving over time with contributions from many writers including Tsuburaya, science fiction writer Shigeru Kayama, Takeo Murata, and Honda. Read more…
Akira Ifukube, 1914-2006
Composer Akira Ifukube died in Tokyo, Japan, on February 8, 2006, at the age of 91, from multiple organ failure.
One of the most important Japanese composers of the twentieth century, Ifukube wrote nearly 300 film scores during a career spanning half a century, but remains internationally famous for his association with Toho’s monster films and especially for creating the thunderous musical identity of Godzilla.
Ifukube was born in Kushiro, Hokkaido, on May 31, 1914. Growing up in northern Japan, he was exposed to the music of the indigenous Ainu people, whose rhythms and melodic patterns would profoundly influence his musical language. Largely self-taught as a composer, he originally studied forestry at Hokkaido Imperial University and worked in the timber industry before turning professionally to music. After World War II he began teaching composition in Tokyo and entered the Japanese film industry.
His first feature score was Senkichi Taniguchi’s Snow Trail in 1947, beginning an extraordinarily prolific period in which he worked with many prominent Japanese directors. Early assignments included Akira Kurosawa’s The Quiet Duel (1949), Kaneto Shindo’s Children of Hiroshima (1952), Josef von Sternberg’s Anatahan (1953), and Hideo Sekigawa’s Hiroshima (1953). His music already displayed the characteristics that would define his career: heavy rhythmic writing, powerful brass, modal melodies and a distinctive fusion of Western symphonic technique with Japanese musical traditions. Read more…
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