Isao Takahata (高畑 勲, Takahata Isao, born October 29, 1935) is a Japanese film director, animator, screenwriter and producer who has earned critical international acclaim for his work as a director of anime films. Takahata is the co-founder of Studio Ghibli along with long-time collaborative partner Hayao Miyazaki. He has directed films such as the grim, war-themed Grave of the Fireflies, the romantic drama Only Yesterday, the ecological adventure Pom Poko, and the comedy My Neighbors the Yamadas. Unlike most anime directors, Takahata does not draw and never worked as an animator before becoming a full-fledged director.

According to Hayao Miyazaki, "Music and study are his hobbies". He was born in the same town as fellow director Kon Ichikawa, while Japanese film giant Yasujirō Ozu was raised by his father in nearby Matsusaka. Takahata graduated from the University of Tokyo French literature course in 1959.

Takahata was originally intrigued by animation after having seen the French animated cartoon feature Le Roi et l'Oiseau based on a fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen. He was impressed by the film, asking "Can these kind of things be done by animation?"

While he was job hunting at his university, Takahata was tempted to join Toei Animation by a friend who knew the company wanted an assistant director. For fun he took the company's entrance examination as he had been originally interested in animation, which he passed, and he joined the company. Takahata finally directed his first film,Hols: Prince of the Sun, after he was recommended for the position by Yasuo Ōtsuka, who was both his and Hayao Miyazaki's instructor. Hols was a commercial failure, and as a member of the production team deemed responsible for the failure, he was accordingly demoted.

After working on a variety of animated television series and films throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, Takahata was invited by Miyazaki to join in founding the animation production company Studio Ghibli after the success of Miyazaki's Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. The first movie directed by Takahata for Ghibli was Grave of the Fireflies. The film was widely acclaimed by film critics, like prominent and influential film critic Roger Ebert who considered it "one of the greatest war films ever made".