 While he had directed over twenty films in the first two decades of his career, he directed just four in these two decades.After directing "Red Beard" (1965), Kurosawa discovered that he was considered old-fashioned and did not work again for almost five years.He also found himself competing against television, which had reduced Japanese film audiences from a high of 1.1 billion in 1958 to under 200 million by 1975.