Control of a back light of a liquid crystal device

An area control section individually sets illumination intensity (light control value) of each backlight cell corresponding to each area of the display screen. A spatial filter corrects the light control values so that spatial distribution of the light control values becomes more moderate between adjoining areas. A black area control section sets the minimum value of the light control value based on a "black area" in the screen. A power control section corrects the light control values so that power consumption of the backlight does not exceed a limit value. A shading control section corrects the light control values to relatively lower brightness in the peripheral part of the screen compared to the central part of the screen. A micro-controller switches the operations of the above light control value correcting sections according to an image display mode selected by the user.