Children of the Great Buddha
1952The final film in the Beehive trilogy, Children of the Great Buddha chronicles war orphans working as tour guides among the looming statues and temples of Japan’s ancient capital of Nara. Shimizu’s uncharacteristic hands-on approach to the film’s cinematography frames the sacred objects as “very real agents” in the children’s threadbare lives, resulting in a deeply moving and spiritual work that fittingly concludes his orphan saga.
Acted in
Ayako Akabori
as Widow
Yoshimasa Chiba
as Yoshi-bô
Keiko Fukushima
as Soldier's wife
Kiyoshi Kawanishi
as Seiji
Yukiko Himori
as Setsuko, Bus guide
Yotaka Iwamoto
as Hôta
Yoshio Kinuta
as Genji
Shinichiro Kubota
as Ichiun
Hiroyuki Mihara
as Hiroyuki
Yoshiharu Miyauchi
as Ryôhei, carver
Sadao Nakamura
as Tan-kô
Yuzaburo Shimada
as Demobilized soldier
Mayumi Utagawa
as Second-generation immigrant