The director Paul Schrader recalls wearing a knife-proof vest on set in Tokyo when he began filming "Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters" in 1984. Japan's ultranationalist right had denounced the production, furious that a group of Americans planned to dramatise the life of Yukio Mishima, a celebrated novelist they revered as a martyr for his failed attempt to restore the emperor's divine authority. Schrader shot the film without incident, and "Mishima" received the award for best artistic contribution at the Cannes Film Festival in 1985. But for decades, it was quietly barred from an official release in Japan.