Their collaborations include The Sword (Ken) (from a book by Yukio Mishima) and Destiny's Son, originally released as 斬る (Kiru).

At this point she received repeated petitions from her husband's brother-in-law, Ichikawa Kudanji III, to allow him to raise the child.

Thus Kudanji was forever labeled as a montei agari – someone born and raised outside of the kabuki world and its "lineage" and later apprenticed into it – and doomed never to exceed a supporting role.

[12] That being the case, no matter how hard Raizō trained, he was unlikely to gain noteworthy roles as a kenmon performer as long as he remained the son of Kudanji.

[13] To that end Tetsuji formed a plan to have Raizō take the name of Nakamura Jakuemon (中村 雀右衛門), which had been unused for a quarter century, but Nakamura Jakuemon III – who was no longer performing, but still alive – was dissatisfied with Raizō's thus-far inability to gain real recognition and refused to allow the name's use.

[21][22] According to the film director Kazuo Ikehiro, around this time rumors began to circulate that Ichikawa Jukai III was actually Raizō's biological father.

[28] Rikiya Tayama has said that the real reason was that Raizō, dissatisfied with the treatment he received over the years, was extremely upset when he was cast as an idiot without a single line in the Osaka Kabukiza's performance of Kōya Hijiri in June 1954,[† 5] and thus decided to leave the world of kabuki for good.

"[30] Once he had decided to pursue a film career, Raizō began to frequent the movie theater to study the performances of Yorozuya Kinnosuke in jidaigeki produced by Toei.

[34] The film critic Tadao Sato wrote that until now Raizō had "portrayed only handsome young samurai and yakuza, as though following in the footsteps of Kazuo Hasegawa" but that now he "has come to be a distinguished actor worthy of high praise, giving fresh performances in elegant dramas, rather than only performing in chanbara – samurai films with an action focus.

[37][38] Masayoshi Tsuchida, then head of Daiei's planning department, said that it must have been an incredible adventure to play "Kiyomori, the youth who pierced the heavens" for the physically frail Raizō.

Raizō was self-conscious about the weakness of his legs and joined the sumo club at Doshisha University in an attempt to train and strengthen them,[34] but it was no use.

[40] In 1958 Kon Ichikawa cast Raizō in the lead role of the film Enjō, based on the novel The Temple of the Golden Pavilion by Yukio Mishima.

"[45] Tokuzō Tanaka said that Raizō's complicated childhood had caused something like a base part of his heart to emerge, merging with and adding depth to his performance.

[49] The Nemuri Kyoshirō series of films, which began in 1963 and are known as Sleepy Eyes of Death in the west, are considered to be the representative work of Raizō's later years.

According to Kazuo Ikehiro, as Raizō's experience as an actor accumulated he began to desire to take a larger role in film creation through directing.

Ikehiro advised Raizō to pursue the role of producer, rather than director, as he would then be able to make decisions about subject matter, scripts, and casting in addition to direction.

Let’s give a new job a shot,” and more specifically “Let’s try to capture Kawatake Mokuami’s works through a modern lens.”[57] In June 1968, while in the process of filming Seki no Yatappe, Raizō visited a doctor because of bloody stool, and was soon admitted to the hospital.

[67] According to Masako, Raizō had said only “I don’t want anyone to see how dreadfully thin I've become,” and because of that wish she had not allowed anyone aside from his adopted father, Jukai, and his company president, Nagata, to see his face after his death.

According to Yahiro, “Even among the great number of jidaigeki actors, nobody else had his good manners – and I mean that in a good way – not a single other actor felt like a true bushi-like swordsman the way he did.”[80] Kazuo Ikehiro said that Raizō's childhood cast a “shadow of heartlessness” over him, and because of that a “shadowed part” and a “true background part" of his life were exposed.

[23] Kazuo Mori, the director with whom Raizō produced the greatest number of films, said that Raizo carried “a human pain of which he didn’t speak to anyone” which he sublimated into each of his performances.

Yamane explained this further, saying “while it’s true that he played a great many tragic roles, it wasn’t simply with a dark depression or gloom; he had a very crisp presentation.

When asked his thoughts on this, Akinari Suzuki said that he felt that Raizō had found success in film because he was not steeped in kabuki in his young childhood, and thus avoided being totally stained by it.

[86] Tokuō Tanaka said, “this guy, with his disarming warmth and aura of purity; as soon as work began he’d transform into an actor, he’d stiffen his shoulders and become immediately commanding, steadfast, dignified and strikingly good-looking.

For someone like me who knew his usual face, it was so surprising that it made my eyes pop open.”[86] According to Inoue, at the time of his debut, Raizō, along with Shintarō Katsu and Takeshi Hanayagi, received makeup instruction from the star Kazuo Hasegawa.

Inoue theorizes that the application of makeup was a crucial part of his process for immersing himself in a role, and thus he didn't want to be observed while doing so.

[87] Yoshio Shirasaki, screenwriter of Kōshoku Ichidai Otoko (First-generation Lecher), said of Raizō's transformation that he normally looked like a company man, but “when he appeared on the screen he’d have undergone a complete change; and in the midst of all the light was this youthful star, fighting against emptiness and loneliness.”[88] Inoue said that the reason that so many of Raizō's movie posters feature an image of him from behind with his head turned to face the camera was because many directors felt that this view of him best showed off his "intriguing emptiness".

As previously mentioned, Daiei's management intended from the start to position Raizō as a successor to the star Kazuo Hasegawa,[90] and it “proceeded smoothly along the tracks.”[91] Tokuzō Tanaka shared the opinion that Katsu, who was the first of the two to make his debut, was “like a second helping of Hasegawa” when he played an attractive young man in his white-faced film makeup;[92] but as the director and supporting cast could hardly be described as first-rate, it was a long time before Katsu managed to become a real success.

[96] Reflecting on the state of things in 1959, Katsu said “The banzuke was totally different,” referring to the document listing sumo wrestlers’ ranks before a tournament.

I still hadn’t entered the san’yaku,” meaning that Raizō could be considered to be among the very highest regarded stars, while Katsu was still a relative unknown.

[99] The author Tomomi Muramatsu indicated that for Raizo, who had “worriedly spent his days in the world of kabuki, which is so dominated by lineage and ceremony, without ever receiving a large role,”[100] and Katsu, whose father had been involved in the backstage world of kabuki,[101] shared “the same complex, this large problem to be solved,” and that they were both equipped with “a similar factor which served as a sort of energy source” for them.