MUMBAI: Japanese film director Nagisa Oshima, best known for his sexually explicit film In the Realm of the Senses and Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence died of pneumonia in Fujisawa, south of Tokyo yesterday (Tuesday).

The British Film Institute described Oshima as one of the important directors of the new wave of Japanese cinema in the 1960s, whose politically charged films were well acclaimed by the audience.

A law graduate, Oshima started his filmmaking career at the age of 26 with the 1959 film A Town of Love and Hope. But fame came to him internationally with the 1976-made film In the Realm of the Senses that was a graphic portrayal of insatiable sexual desire between a hotel owner and one of his maids in Japan of the 1930s.

Oshima won the best director award at the Cannes Film Festival in 1978 for his film Empire of Passion, another erotic tale.

He later associated with British actor,singer David Bowie for the 1983 made film Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence that was based on author Laurens van der Post‘s experiences as a prisoner of war in Japan during the second World War.

In 1996, Oshima suffered a stroke but recovered soon to return briefly to filmmaking when he made his last film Taboo in 1999.