Kazuaki Kiriya

Personal Info

Known For Director

Gender Male

Birthday 1968-04-20 (56 years old)

Place of Birth Kumamoto, Japan

Also Known As Kaz I Kiriya

Kazuaki Kiriya

Biography

Kazuaki Kiriya, born April 20, 1968, is a Japanese photographer and director of films and music videos. In 1983, in his second year of junior high school, he moved to the United States. He attended Northfield Mount Hermon School and the Cambridge School in Weston, Massachusetts and then the School of Constructed Environments at Parsons The New School for Design in New York. At first, as a student, he aimed to enter the business world, but through the experience of seeing others' pleasure when he communicated through drawing at times when his English failed him, he came to be more oriented toward the world of art. Beginning in 1994, he became involved in designing album covers, photography, and directing music videos for many recording artists including Hikaru Utada, SMAP, The Back Horn, Mr. Children, Misia, Southern All Stars, Glay, and Ayumi Hamasaki. Kiriya made his feature film debut in 2004, writing and directing the ambitious live action film adaptation of Casshan. The film was among the first to be shot on a digital backlot. In 2009, he wrote and directed his second film, Goemon (a fantasy epic based on the life of Ishikawa Goemon), in which he also appeared in a cameo as Akechi Mitsuhide. In 2015, Kiriya directed his first English-language film, Last Knights, a reimagining of the legend of the forty-seven ronin.

Known For

Director

2022
The Little Star

as Director

2015
Last Knights

as Director

2009
Goemon

as Director

2004
Casshern

as Director

Writer

2023
2023
From the End of the World

as Original Concept

2022
The Little Star

as Writer

2009
Goemon

as Original Story

2009
Goemon

as Screenplay

2004
Casshern

as Screenplay

Producer

2023
From the End of the World

as Executive Producer

2015
Last Knights

as Producer

Camera

2004
Casshern

as Director of Photography

Editor

2004
Casshern

as Editor