Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#888
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Nobuo Tobita works on versatility rather than volume, and the catalogue keeps proving that the quieter choice was the correct one.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Nobuo Tobita appears in 12 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Nobuo. Chibi Maruko-chan is the clearest case: a film rated 8.5 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for mystery, fantasy, drama. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Tomohiko Ito, Haruo Sotozaki, Katsuya Shigehara and others, Nobuo Tobita helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
Chibi Maruko-chan (2019) as Sueo Maruo (voice) · Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie (2019) as Adelheid von Schugel (voice) · The Keeper of the Camphor Tree (2026) as (voice)
Career snapshot
Ranked #888 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
12
2012–2026
Career length
14 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
8.5
Chibi Maruko-chan
Average Nutevio score
7.3
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
8.5
Chibi Maruko-chan
Most frequent director
Tomohiko Ito
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Tomohiko Ito
Most common genre
Animation
12 titles
Average runtime
1h 43m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.3
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.8
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
2010s
7.4 average MV
The 2010s are where the work and the material meet. Mr. Osomatsu the Movie, Chibi Maruko-chan, BlackFox — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2010s
7.4
Across 5 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2010s
7.4
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
2010s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Mr. Osomatsu the Movie, Chibi Maruko-chan, BlackFox.
Most productive era
2020s
7 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.61 film | 7.02 films |
| Action | 7.32 films | 6.94 films |
| Thriller | 7.61 film | — |
| Comedy | 7.52 films | 7.41 film |
| Crime | — | 6.82 films |
| Horror | — | 7.41 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
2012Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: Beginnings
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Host (voice).
Highest rated performance · Career peak
8.5 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2026The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
The current state of the argument, as (voice).
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
12 of 12 films
as Sueo Maruo (voice)
Directed by Unknown
as (voice)
Directed by Tomohiko Ito
as (voice)
Directed by Haruo Sotozaki
as Adelheid von Schugel (voice)
Directed by Yutaka Uemura
as Host (voice)
Directed by Yukihiro Miyamoto
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
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The defining work
#1
Sueo Maruo (voice)
Chibi Maruko-chan (2019)
Performance score8.2
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Sueo Maruo (voice) gives Nobuo Tobita a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
(voice)
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree (2026)
Performance score7.8
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
(voice)
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle (2025)
Performance score7.8
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Adelheid von Schugel (voice)
Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie (2019)
Performance score7.8
Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Adelheid von Schugel (voice) is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Sueo Maruo (voice)
Start here. Chibi Maruko-chan is the clearest statement of what Nobuo Tobita does — accessible, 94 minutes, and rated 8.5 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Nobuo at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: Beginnings (2012)
Keeps the animation register of Chibi Maruko-chan but asks for a colder reading of it.
Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie (2019)
Keeps the fantasy register of Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: Beginnings but asks for a colder reading of it.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle (2025)
Keeps the action register of Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree (2026)
Keeps the fantasy register of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Yukihiro Miyamoto
Director
1 film together
Notably Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: Beginnings
Yutaka Uemura
Director
1 film together
Notably Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie
Kazuya Nomura
Director
1 film together
Notably BlackFox
Youichi Fujita
Director
1 film together
Notably Mr. Osomatsu the Movie
Masaki Tachibana
Director
1 film together
Notably Princess Principal Crown Handler: Chapter 1
Susumu Mitsunaka
Director
1 film together
Notably Detective Conan: The Bride of Halloween
Yoshimi Itazu
Director
1 film together
Notably The Concierge
Katsuya Shigehara
Director
1 film together
Notably Detective Conan: One-Eyed Flashback
Haruo Sotozaki
Director
1 film together
Notably Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle
Tomohiko Ito
Director
1 film together
Notably The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Yutaka Uemura
Director
1 film together · 8.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Saga of Tanya the Evil: The MovieTomohiko Ito
Director
1 film together · 8.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Keeper of the Camphor TreeHaruo Sotozaki
Director
1 film together · 8.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity CastleYukihiro Miyamoto
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: BeginningsKatsuya Shigehara
Director
1 film together · 7.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Detective Conan: One-Eyed FlashbackYoshimi Itazu
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The ConciergeKazuya Nomura
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
BlackFoxSusumu Mitsunaka
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Detective Conan: The Bride of HalloweenYouichi Fujita
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Mr. Osomatsu the MovieMasaki Tachibana
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Princess Principal Crown Handler: Chapter 1Six degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
Chibi Maruko-chan
as Sueo Maruo (voice)
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
as (voice)
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Chibi Maruko-chan
as Sueo Maruo (voice)
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle
as (voice)
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Chibi Maruko-chan
as Sueo Maruo (voice)
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Nobuo Tobita has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Animation Legend
Awarded
12 catalogue titles in animation, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
as (voice)
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
as (voice)
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
as (voice)
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
The Keeper of the Camphor Tree
as (voice)
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle
as (voice)
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Princess Principal Crown Handler: Chapter 1
as Bishop (voice)
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Saga of Tanya the Evil: The Movie
as Adelheid von Schugel (voice)
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie Part I: Beginnings
as Host (voice)
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
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Matt Damon
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Morgan Freeman
Built a career in the same territory: action and crime
Jamie Harris
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Have your say
Community
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Reference
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