Renzo Kinoshita - 1990

"Renzo Kinoshita began working as an independent animator in 1967. His own major work, Made in Japan won the Grand Prix at the New York International Animation Festival in 1972. He became involved with ASIFA (The International Animated Film Association) and was a tower of strength as vice president. His wisdom and dedication had a great influence on animation in Japan and throughout Asia and he established the ASIFA Japan national group in 1981. In 1985, the first Hiroshima Animation Festival was held as a result of long years of tireless work by him and his wife Sayoko. His other well-known works include Japonese (1977)--a send up of all things Japanese, Picadon (1978)--a moving portrayal of the horror of the A-bomb attack on Hiroshima, and The Last Air Raid Kumagaya (1993). It was a great pleasure to work with him and I was proud to be his friend. I will miss him sorely."

--Pat Raine Webb, President, ASIFA-UK

As Pat Webb so eloquently states in her brief tribute, Renzo Kinoshita was a major figure in the international animation community. For many, he and his wife Sayoko were the personification of the spirit of independent filmmaking in Japan, and were closely associated with ASIFA-Japan and the Hiroshima Animation Festival. But in talking to Miyasan Sadao Miyamoto, a veteran Japanese animation artist who knew Renzo since they were both apprentice animators in Osaka back in 1957, I got a somewhat different perspective on him as both artist and human being.

Miyasan, whose appearance, with trim beard and bald head, as he likes to point out, makes him look very much like Renzo, is currently character art manager at Disney Consumer Products in Burbank. He came there after working as a directing animator and designer at Baer Animation. His career in Japan spanned nearly 35 years and includes working at Osamu Tezuka's Mushi Productions on Astro Boy. He also worked at Sanrio (in Tokyo and Los Angeles) and Toei Animation, before establishing his own company , Raku-Kobu, an animation and merchandizing company in Tokyo, in 1989.

The following is based on my conversation with Miyasan, with Willie Ito, another friend of Renzo and a colleague at Disney, acting as translator. Miyasan said he had "many, many memories of Renzo," and here are some of the ones he shared with me.

Kinoshita's The Last Air Raid Kumagaya(1993).

We were both from the Osaka area and started at the same time at a little animation studio there where we were in training together. Renzo sat in front of me and he looked older; I thought he was a veteran animator and was thus a little shy about approaching him. Meanwhile, Renzo looked back at me and thought I was an old veteran, and was also a little reticent about striking up a conversation. And that, basically is how our friendship began.

Eventually, I moved to Tokyo and started working for Mushi Productions. Then, lo and behold, Renzo came there and started working there at the studio, where we both worked on Astro Boy as animators.

There are some funny little anecdotes I could tell about when we were a bunch of young guys working together, raising hell and doing all sorts of funny things. Renzo was a little cheap about going to the barber shop. Back then, believe it or not, he had a lot of hair and I had an Elvis Presley. Renzo asked me if I could give him a trim. So, I took a pair of paper scissors and started to trim his hair. It was kind of uneven, so I cut a little bit more. There were a bunch other guys working in the place and one of them said, "Let me have a hand at it now." Eventually, they all got in on it and pretty soon his hair was a total mess, short here and long there. In the end, he was forced to go to a barber shop and have it corrected. But, of course, the barber cut everything to match the short part. So, when he came back to the office, he was almost bald. The irony of it all is that it never really grew back to its fullest. So, the way we all remember Renzo, with his bald head was the result of us fooling around and giving him this haircut.

There was another animator, who would go out and raise hell with me and Renzo. But I was the one who would have to watch their sake drinking to make sure these two guys didn't get into any trouble. This all happened, of course, before Renzo was married to Sayokosan.