Toho Company Ltd.

**Toho Company, Limited** (東宝株式会社 *Tōhō Kabushiki-Kaisha*?, lit. Toho Co., Ltd.) is a Japanese film studio. It is headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo, and is one of the core companies of the Hankyu Hanshin Toho Group. In the West, it is best known as the producer of many kaiju and tokusatsu movies, the films of Akira Kurosawa, and the anime films of Studio Ghibli, as well as the Pokémon movies.

The company's most famous creation, the *Godzilla* franchise, was created by Tomoyuki Tanaka.

It’s one of Japan's four major film studios.

## History

Toho was founded by the Hankyu Railway in 1932 as the *Tokyo-Takarazuka Theater Company*. It managed much of the kabuki in Tokyo and, among other properties, the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater and the Imperial Garden Theater in Tokyo; Toho and Shochiku enjoyed a duopoly over theaters in Tokyo for many years.

After several successful film exports to the United States during the 1950s, Toho opened the La Brea Theatre in Los Angeles to show its own films without selling to a distributor. It was known as the Toho Theatre from the late 1960s until the 1970s.  Toho also had a theater in San Francisco and opened a theater in New York in 1963.

The Shintoho Company was so named "New Toho" because it broke off from Toho.

They have contributed to the production of some American films, including Sam Raimi's *A Simple Plan*.

## Productions

### 1950s

* *Seven Samurai*
* *Godzilla*
* *Invisible Man*
* *Godzilla Raids Again*
* *Half Human*
* Warning from Space
* *Rodan*
* *The Mysterians*
* *The Legend of the White Serpent*
* *Throne of Blood*
* *H-Man*
* *Varan the Unbelievable*
* *The Birth of Japan*
* *Battle in Outer Space*

### 1960s

* *The Secret of Telegian*
* *The Human Vapor*
* *Mothra*
* *King Kong vs. Godzilla*
* *Gorath*
* *Atragon*
* *Matango*
* *Mothra vs. Godzilla*
* *Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster*
* *Dogora*
* *Devil Woman*
* *Invasion of Astro-Monster*
* *Frankenstein vs. Baragon*
* *Punch Guy*
* *War of the Gargantuas*
* *Ebirah, Horror of the Deep*
* *Son of Godzilla*
* *King Kong Escapes*
* *Destroy All Monsters*
* *All Monsters Attack*
* *Latitude Zero*

### 1970s

* *Space Amoeba*
* *Godzilla vs. Hedorah*
* *Godzilla vs. Gigan*
* *Godzilla vs. Megalon*
* *Submersion of Japan*
* *Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla*
* *Prophecies of Nostradamus*
* *Terror of Mechagodzilla*
* *Demon Spies*
* *The War in Space*
* The Last Dinosaur
* *Zero Fighter*

### 1980s

* *Bye-Bye Jupiter*
* *The Return of Godzilla*
* *Ran*
* *Godzilla vs. Biollante*

### 1990s

* *Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah*
* *Godzilla vs. Mothra*
* *Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II*
* *Gunhed*
* *Yamato Takeru*
* *Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla*
* *Godzilla vs. Destoroyah*
* *Rebirth of Mothra*
* *Rebirth of Mothra II*
* *Rebirth of Mothra III*
* *Godzilla 2000: Millennium*

### 2000s

* *Godzilla vs. Megaguirus*
* *Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack*
* *Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla*
* *Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.*
* *Godzilla: Final Wars*
* *Go! Godman*

### 2010s

* *Godzilla* (licensed to Legendary Pictures, distributed in Japan)
* *Attack on Titan* (co-produced with Kodansha, Licri, and Nikkatsu)
* *Shin Godzilla*
* *Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters*
* *Godzilla*
* *Godzilla: King of the Monsters*

### 2020s

* *Godzilla vs. Kong*
* *Godzilla Singular Point*

## Staff

### Former

#### Producers

* Akira Kurosawa
* Eiji Tsuburaya
* Hayao Miyazaki
* Jun Fukuda
* Shogo Tomiyama
* Tomoyuki Tanaka
* Yoshinari Shimatani

#### Directors

* Akira Kurosawa
* Hayao Miyazaki
* Ishiro Honda
* Jun Fukuda
* Kinji Fukasaku
* Masaaki Tezuka
* Nobuhiko Obayasaki
* Shinji Higuchi
* Shusuke Kaneko
* Takao Okawra
* Toshiro Mifune

#### Writers

* Akira Kurosawa
* Hayao Miyazaki
* Ikuma Dam
* Ishiro Honda
* Jun Fukuda
* Kinji Fukasaku
* Masaaki Tezuka
* Nobuhiko Obayashi
* Seishi Yokomizo
* Shogo Tomiyama
* Shusuke Kaneko
* Takao Okawara
* Tomoyuki Tanaka
* Wataru Mimura

#### Composers

* Akira Ifukube
* Fumio Hayasaka
* Ikuma Dan
* Isao Tomita
* Joe Hisaishi
* Kiyoko Ogino
* Kow Otani
* Kunio Miyauchi
* Masamichi Amano
* Masaru Sato
* Michiru Oshima
* Reijiro Koroku
* Riichiro Manabe
* Shiro Sagisu
* Takayuki Hattori
* Toru Takemitsu
* Toshiyuki Watanabe
* Yasuharu Takanashi

#### Special Effects Crew

* Eiji Tsuburaya
* Ishiro Honda
* Kenji Suzuki
* Koichi Kawakita
* Masaaki Tezuka
* Nobuhiko Obayashi
* Shinji Higuchi
* Takao Okawara
* Teruyoshi Nakano

#### Musical Artists

* Asami Abe
* Masatoh Eve
* U-Ya Asaoka

#### Editors

* Akira Kurosawa
* Nobuhiko Obayashi