Sessue Hayakawa: cinema’s forgotten sex symbol who was saved from death by his dog

The brooding and brilliant Japanese actor rivalled Rudolph Valentino but battled orientalist caricature before finding solace in Zen and watercolours

This month, the Cinema Rediscovered festival in Bristol will screen a rarely seen film from 1919 that offers a glimpse of the early career of a Japanese Hollywood star. Sessue Hayakawa, Oscar-nominated for playing the tyrannical Colonel Saito in David Lean’s The Bridge on the River Kwai in 1957, was a matinee idol back in the silent era. In fact he was one of the film industry’s first sex symbols, with a legion of female fans and a complex star persona that reflected America’s deep-seated prejudices about, and fascination with, Japanese culture. These ideas would make themselves painfully obvious throughout his career, which spanned six decades.

The Dragon Painter, from 1919, was made by Hayakawa’s own production company, and co-stars his wife, Tsuru Aoki. It is unusual among his American films for being set entirely in Japan, with Japanese characters – a break from the villain casting that held Hayakawa back in Hollywood.