川尻 善昭
Kwajiri Yoshiaki is an acclaimed Japanese creator of animated films. Born in Yokohama in 1950, he began working as a line animator straight out of high school. Gradually working his way up the ranks to director, he first gained attention with his 1987 neo-noir/horror masterpiece Wicked City. Given more freedom to pursue his own projects after the success of Wicked City, he wrote and directed the 1993 anime classic Ninja Scroll, loosely based on the life of legendary feudal-era samurai Yagyu Jubei. He followed up with another megahit in the form of 2000's Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust which was based on a novel by Kikuchi Hideyuki. By 2002, his international profile was high enough that he was selected as one of the "best of the best" Japanese animators to create a short for the Animatrix anthology, set in the universe of the Matrix trilogy of films. More recently, he has written and directed an officially sanctioned Highlander-series animated film, Highlander: The Search for Vengeance, and is working on a sequel to Ninja Scroll.