(18 November 1903 – 16 September 1981) was a prominent left-wing Japanese
film critic,
historian, and
producer. Born in
Tokyo, he became interested in
film from his student days at
Tokyo University. Early on, he helped introduce
German experimental film in
Japan, and was instrumental in getting
Teinosuke Kinugasa's masterpiece
A Page of Madness screened in Tokyo. Afterward, he became involved in
Marxist politics and established a career promoting progressive cinema and criticism. He wrote or edited over thirty books of film criticism, history, theory and biography during his career. He was also involved in film production, first serving from the late 1920s as a central member of the
Proletarian Film League of Japan (
Prokino), where he acted as not only the theoretical brain of the movement alongside
Genju Sasa, but also as a filmmaker. When Prokino was effectively eliminated by police oppression under the
Peace Preservation Law, Iwasaki continued his critical activities, becoming involved in the Yuibutsuron Kenkyukai with such thinkers as
Jun Tosaka, but was eventually arrested in 1940, in part for his opposition to the Film Law, which authorized increased government control of the film industry. He was the only film critic arrested by the ideological police during the war. After his release, he worked for a time at the Tokyo office of the
Manchukuo Film Association thanks to the help of Kan'ichi Negishi.