Takao Okawara (大河原 孝夫, Ōkawara Takao, born December 20, 1949, in Tokyo) is a Japanese film director, writer, and producer.
Most famous for his entries in the Heisei Godzilla series, Takao Okawara joined Tōhō in 1973, but would not get his first shot in the director's chair until 1980, when he joined Akira Kurosawa and Ishirō Honda on the film Kagemusha (1980).
Four years later, he worked as an assistant director for the first Godzilla film of the Heisei series: The Return of Godzilla (1984).
Okawara debuted as primary director seven years later on the film Reiko, the Psyche Resurrected (1991), which he also wrote.
This biographical article related to film in Japan is a stub.