Imamura Shohei, Japanese film director and screenwriter (Tokyo, September 15, 1926 - Tokyo, May 30, 2006). He studied history at Waseda University, as an assistant director he workd since 1951, made his debut in 1958, and in 1965 founded an independent company. A member of Japan's "New Wave", he is occupied with mostly social themes; most acclaimed for the films The Insect Woman (Nippon konchuki, 1963), about the peasant girl lead for prostitution, Pigs and Battleships (Buta to gunkan, 1961), about contemporary corruption-ridden Japan, and for The Ballad of Narayama (Narayama bushi-ko, 1983); awarded the Golden Palm at Cannes, a movie written according to the legend of an old man who was consciously left by his family to die.