"I think that Ozu is the greatest director ever to work in the history of cinema, and if I had to choose his competitor it would be Mizoguchi and if I lived on a desert island I would just take all their films with me and that would be fine. That's cinema as far as I'm concerned.
And I think he's making great films from almost the start of his career. I don't think we find a steady ascent towards perfection and then a falling off like we do find in some directors. I don't think we find that zigzag up and down that we find in many great directors like John Ford. I think this guy had the hottest hand of anybody. I can't imagine a film of Ozu that I would actively call 'bad'" (Ozu scholar David Bordwell, interview from The Only Son [1936] DVD).
How often have you heard someone refer to a film as being "poetic"? Googling "poetic film" took me here. These posts were made over a period of 14 months (8/09 to 10/10) and mention about 50 films. Not one Ozu film was proposed.
Michael Radford's brilliant Il Postino was mentioned several times; an obvious choice because the movie is about an actual poet (Neruda). So were such "dreamy" films as Herzog's Nosferatu the Vampyre, Tarkovsky's The Mirror (just about all of Tarkovsky's films feature the poetry of his father, Arseny), Benigni's Life is Beautiful and Tarantino's Pulp Fiction. All these so-called art films do in fact have either a dreamy, poetic quality about them or attempt to pretty much literally transform written poem to visual image (see most Tarkovsky, esp. Andrei Rublev)...
In these seven posts I will attempt to emphasize the particulars underlying my own personal assertion that the films of Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963) are Poetry in Moving Images -- works of art eternal in their splendor which inspire one to decipher meaning, probe form, and observe the cosmic humor and tragedy on display.
Of course, there is nothing else remotely like Ozu in the history of cinema (though many now copy him) -- this uniqueness alone requires close investigation.
I have a pretty massive DVD collection (2000+). When I buy DVDs, I have only one criterion: is this a film that I will want to watch more than once? When I re-watch an Ozu film, I feel like an old friend has dropped by. We'll talk about the same old stuff and enjoy each other's company and that's the plot!
A typical Ozu film has very little going on, plot-wise. But because the story is presented to us with such unassuming realism; familiar characterization, meticulous set design; rock-solid steady and invisible camera; and the acting so completely void of artifice, the end result is something startlingly transcendental. (It is said that Ozu treated his actors badly ... he made them do so many takes, some thought it cruel -- but it was his way of beating out the "performer" in the actor and obtaining something very "real").
If you've already seen some or all of Ozu's surviving films, I hope you'll enjoy re-watching them, perhaps grokking anew with some of my more unusual bullet-points in mind. If you are new to Ozu, I hope my writing makes you interested in seeing these masterpieces. Imagine how gratified I will feel if you become an Ozu-nut, like myself.
Yasujiro Ozu was born in Tokyo on December 12, 1903. His father was a fertilizer salesman. He and his brothers -- as was the custom in middle-class families at the time -- were sent to the countryside to be educated. Ozu was a rebellious, undisciplined student. He matriculated no further than middle school, preferring his twin passions of watching American films and drinking. He rarely saw his father between 1913 and 1923, but forged a potent relationship with his loving mother -- Ozu never married and lived with her until her death in 1962 at the age of 87. Ozu himself died just a year later -- the day before his 60th birthday, December 11, 1963. Carved on his tombstone is a single Japanese character -- mu -- the Zen nothingness that is everything.
(For more detailed biographies, go here, here and here.)
Ozu's uncle got him his first job in the film industry as an assistant cameraman, which basically involved schlepping heavy cameras from place to place. He worked his way up to become an assistant director to the both now and then obscure Tadamoto Okubo, who "specialized in a kind of comedy which was called 'nonsense-mono' -- a running series of gags held together by a slight story line, a succession of chuckles intended to make the time pass" ["Ozu" by Donald Richie, p. 200] (must reading for any serious fan).
Ozu was quite satisfied with the position. He could drink to his heart's content (he was a heavy drinker, all his life) and had none of the responsibilities and worries that he quickly realized were the domain of the director.
Nevertheless, his friends urged him on and an incident (a waiter at the studio cafeteria insulted him) provoked him to overcome the inertia of his non-ambition. Besides, he had always loved film (almost all American -- at his job interview, he admitted to having seen only three Japanese films!) and probably felt the confidence to strike out on his own.
Ozu directed 54 films between 1927 and 1962.
- Thirty-seven survive in at least abbreviated form.
- Thirty-five are silent, 19 talkies.
- Forty-eight are in B&W and six in color.
- By decade:
- 1921-1930: 19 films
- 1931-1940: 18 films
- 1941-1950: 6 films
- 1951-1960: 18 films
- 1961-1962: 2 films.
- Of the 37 surviving films, 27 are available on DVD -- most of them on the Criterion Collection or their budget label, Eclipse -- but some of the earlier films are available only from Asia, and require a region-free DVD player (which are quite affordable these days). Naturally, the quality of the Criterion releases is extraordinary.
Of the surviving completed films, I will discuss four in the first two posts; five in the third; four in the fourth and fifth; and three in each of the final two posts (the six color films) ...
Today:
*8. Gakusei romansu: Wakaki hi (Days of Youth) (4/13/29) (103 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*22. Tokyo no gassho (Tokyo Chorus) (8/15/31) (91 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*24. Umarete wa mita keredo (I Was Born, But...) (6/3/32) (100 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*28. Hijosen no onna (Dragnet Girl) (4/27/33) (100 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
Synopsis in red = No Existing Print [NEP]
Synopsis in blue = existing print or clip but no commercial release
*Synopsis in black = DVD
1. Zange no yaiba (Blade of Penitence) (10/14/27) (ca. 70 min.) [Silent B&W No Existing Print NEP]
His first picture -- 53 more would follow! -- was an adaptation of an American film, "Kick-In," directed by George Fitzmaurice in 1922. Ozu had not actually seen the film, but had read about it in a film magazine. Mandatory military service came calling before he had wrapped the picture. A friend finished it up for him, and Ozu claims to have seen it only once.
2. Wakodo no yume (Dreams of Youth) (4/29/28) (ca. 50 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
A comedy about college dorm life, based on American films Ozu had seen.
3. Nyobo funshitsu (Wife Lost) (6/16/28) (ca. 50 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Ozu disliked the script but made this light comedy about marital mix-ups into a film because he was ordered to.
4. Kabocha (Pumpkin) (8/31/28) (ca. 60 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Comedy about a young man and his mishaps with girls. Ozu states that he learned a great deal about continuity making this film.
5. Hikkoshi fufu (A Couple on the Move) (9/28/28) (ca. 60 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Comedy about a couple who cannot stand living in the same house and are continually moving. Ozu began to articulate his unique style with this picture. Unfortunately -- he says -- his final cut was badly reedited and far from his own personal vision.
6. Nikutaibi (Baby Beautiful) (12/1/28) (ca. 60 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Comedy about an unemployed husband who becomes his artist wife's model. When her paintings fail to win prizes, she becomes his model, and his paintings (because they are of a nude female) win all the first prizes. Ozu was happy with the result, and the critics and public took notice.
7. Takara no yama (Treasure Mountain) (2/22/29) (ca. 100 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Comedy/melodrama about the jealousy between a traditional young geisha and a modern schoolgirl. Ozu recalls not sleeping for five days because the studio wanted the film in a hurry.
*8. Gakusei romansu: Wakaki hi (Days of Youth) (4/13/29) (103 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
The first surviving film and what a precious jewel it is!
The 25-year-old director who would eventually make such great masterpieces is still churning out the type of pictures his mentor Okubo had made, and which the studio was no doubt demanding -- more or less mindless comedies with as much spark and spirit as Ozu could put into it.
There are, however, several telltale signs of Ozu's growing confidence in his ability to make a commercial film that would also satisfy his artistic ambitions.
Two college students room together and prepare for a ski trip following final exams. They both fall for the same girl, but she is not interested in either of them; she's about to become engaged to the ski instructor. On the train back to Tokyo they commiserate about lost love, then find out that they've flunked. The friends try to maintain a positive attitude and look forward to the future.
- The DVD requires a region-free player.
- There is no recorded score for the film on this DVD. As you watch it, try to imagine the live music, and of course the benshi, who literally brought the film to life for the contemporary audience.
- The Japanese title cards have excellent English translations.
- The background behind the credits is riotous (especially when compared to the later backgrounds of plain burlap).
- Amidst the cacophony of images and English writing:
- "Irish Hearts"
- "Two is company" (at the very top)
- Three's a crowd" (at the very bottom)
- The film opens with an awesome slow 180° pan showing the city of Tokyo. All of the usual Hollywood techniques from this era are on display throughout the film -- pans, fades, even a dissolving double-exposure at one point. The cutting is typical and the picture is filled with sight gags which were probably at least mildly amusing at the time.
- All of this will disappear in Ozu's mature work. The camera will remain fixed at his famous "tatami-mat" level (supposedly at eye level while sitting on tatami -- but in reality, Ozu often brought the camera much lower -- just a few inches off the floor). Nearly without exception, he will use only the 50mm lens; no filmic punctuation whatsoever except the straight cut, and complete disregard of the 180° rule in favor of direct, straight-on shots of each character separated only by straight cuts. But in 1929, we can see the influence of American filmmakers, particularly Ernst Lubitsch.
- After the first part of the opening pan, Ozu does a quick zoom-in (!) on the first title card -- "Near a University, Tokyo." The pan then continues past a soccer field and over the rooftops of houses. A cut and the pan resumes, closer to the structures. The camera finally comes to rest on a sign taped to the shoji -- "Room Upstairs to Rent."
- The actors are terrific. Bin Watanabe (Yuki Ichirô) is an imp of a college student who lives in the upstairs room. His scam is waiting until a pretty girl answers his ad. After rejecting a man then a dowdy young woman, we meet Chieko (Junko Matsui) who agrees to take the room.
- Ozu's sets show such interesting details; here we see a poster on the wall for the hit Frank Borzage film "7th Heaven" [1927], which won the very first Academy Award given for Best Director.
- Out on the street, she runs into Shuichi Yamamoto (Saitô Tatsuo), a Harold Lloyd look-alike here. (In a few years, he will go on to play the father in Ozu's first big success, "I Was Born But...")
- There are plenty of gags -- pretty corny 80 years later, but probably quite funny for the contemporary audience:
- Yamamoto props his left hand up against a pole with a sign attached reading "Wet Paint." Ozu drags this gag out as the couple has tea; he gets paint on his teacup and his face.
- Watanabe wakes up Yamamoto with an alarm clock.
- As he overcomes Yamamoto's initial resistance to his becoming a roommate, Watanabe makes himself at home, helping himself to long stalks of Libby's California Asparagus.
- Watanabe and Chieko. She is trying to ignore him, reading ... He toys with some figurines on her desk, twisting one of them into a position with four-on-the-floor, back arched up high and bug-eyed face looking right at Chieko. She laughs slightly. He looks uncomfortable. He'll try something else. She looks up and he is tickling the figurine's behind with his fingers. She laughs a little longer. He breaks a figurine.
- A student caught cheating tries to eat the evidence.
- Two recurring related gags at the ski slopes:
- Yamamoto can't ski. He's constantly falling down. His rival, Watanabe, takes advantage of this at every opportunity.
- Watanabe, in turn, thinks it's hysterical to knock down Chieko at every chance. She seems to find it less humorous.
- Yamamoto sends one of Watanabe's skis off, whizzing down the slope. After chasing it, Watanabe lunges at the ski (it appeared to have stopped), only to have it continue moving (It's a terrible effect -- someone just yanked on a hidden string to get the ski moving again).
- The early signs of Ozu's genius are there to see:
- A tight script, wonderful characterizations; one notices the elisions:
- When Chieko and Yamamoto first meet each other on the street, he says:
- "Have you knitted the socks for me?"
- With this one title card, Ozu avoids a lengthy and completely unnecessary exposition. We now know that they are friends.
- Ozu shows us much of the students preparing for their exams. We see nothing of the actual taking of the exams, only the aftermath.
- When Chieko and Yamamoto first meet each other on the street, he says:
- The pillow shot (in this film, consisting of telephone poles, factory smokestacks, a wind vane).
- A tight script, wonderful characterizations; one notices the elisions:
- The film ends with the same slow 180° pan, but in reverse direction.
- The pan, or dolly shot, is the sole technical device that will never completely disappear from Ozu's film vocabulary. In his later works, however, he will use it only a few times (usually in parallels ... see Early Summer, for example). Fades, wipes, dissolves -- virtually any camera movement -- all this will completely disappear by the 1950's.
- The idea of bookending an initial image (in this case, the pan of Tokyo) became a favorite script technique for Ozu and Kôga Noda, his writing partner for most of his career. (In the later films, it is often a shot of the sea.)
9. Wasei kenka tomodachi (Fighting Friends) (7/5/29) (ca. 100 min. [?]) [Silent B&W NEP but 2:29 survives. See it here.]
Two truck drivers fall in love with the same girl.
The short clip begins with a title card "Evening." A man (Yuki Ichirô) enters into what is presumably his home and gives his (probably girlfriend?) a kimono which he bought secondhand. She is delighted and goes into the other room to try it on. (Prominent poster on the wall for either The Uninvited Guest [1923] or The Uninvited Guest [1924].) A second man arrives (he looks scruffy; more like a truck driver than the other guy!) to the first man's obvious annoyance. The woman comes back into the room with her new/old kimono. A series of shots establishes the tension between the two men. They engage in some sort of eating contest (I can't really tell what's going on here. It appears that Man Two eats these little round things that are surprisingly hot; Man One also eats them (or does he? look carefully -- he may be performing a sleight-of-hand; can't tell) but the heat apparently doesn't bother him. Man Two finally takes a long drink of water from the fishbowl. Man One laughs heartily.
10. Daigaku wa detekereda (I Graduated, But...) (9/6/29) (ca. 100 min.) [Silent B&W NEP but 8:16 survives. See it here.]
Even with only eight minutes of film, it is plain to see that Ozu is evolving; moving beyond the 'nonsense-mono' of his previous pictures to a newer, more serious dynamic.
Takada Minoru goes for a job interview and turns down the offer of receptionist, thinking it's beneath him. However, when his mother arrives, along with his fiancee Machiko, he conceals his unemployment until the marriage. When Machiko discovers his situation, she has a fit. Later that evening, Takada patronises a bar and finds Machiko moonlighting there. He is furious with her but eventually he becomes aware of her sacrifice, and pleads with his interviewer for the job he rejected. Instead, he is told that the previous offer was a test, and he is given a better position.
Machiko is played by the amazing Kinuyo Tanaka, who would go on to become one of the most important actresses in Japanese film history. (Her turns in Mizoguchi's Ugestu and Sansho the Bailiff, for example, are unforgetable.)
The clip has a soundtrack of traditional Japanese music (if you enjoy this, try any of these beautiful Toru Takemitsu CD's! @ # $ % ^ ) ...
- After Minoru leaves the interview, he tears up his resumé and the pieces fall at his feet. Ozu continues his penchant for showing us this angle at a dynamic, dramatic moment...
- There are several places where you can see the flashes of a frame or two of the original Japanese title card.
- Again, Ozu prominently displays a poster for a Hollywood film -- in this case, Speedy (1928), starring Harold Lloyd.
- A nice use of parallelism: Minoru is at a bar when he spots Machiko, who -- unbeknownst to him -- has been working there as a hostess/waitress. He sees her light a match for customer's cigarette. He is about to light up himself, but when another hostess offers him a light, he declines it and puts down the cigarette. Later, at home, she tries to help him light his cigarette, but he ignores her and she burns her finger.
- My Japanese friend tells me that the difficult translations for these "but ..." titles might be something along these lines:
- I Graduated, But... = ... why is my life so unsuccessful now?
- I Flunked, But... = ... so many wonderful things are happening, it doesn't matter!
- I Was Born, But... = ... why do I have to go through all this hardship?
11. Kaishain seikatsu (The Life of an Office Worker) (10/25/29) (ca. 85 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
A comedy (?) about a husband and wife who look forward to a year-end bonus, only to discover that, because of the general depression (the film was released on October 25, 1929), the husband has been fired. He looks for job, fails to find one, and is finally hired by several friends.
The term shomin-geki ("home drama") begins to appear in Ozu's filmography at this point. Perhaps he is being pigeon-holed here -- but regardless of how faithful he was or was not to the accepted norms of the genre is besides the point. Ozu had found his calling.
12. Tokkan kozô (A Straightforward Boy) (11/24/29) (ca. 57 min.) [Silent B&W NEP but 1:29 survives. See it here.]
A romp about a hapless crook who gets more than he's bargained for when he kidnaps a brat with an insatiable appetite for sweets. Unable to keep him under control, the kidnapper returns him to his father, who refuses to take him back. He tries to dump him on his playmates, but he incites them to demand toys and other goodies from him, making him run a mile.
- More interested in character than in comedy.
- He had found his major theme: the Japanese family, either directly or in its extensions, the school and the office.
- This led to an interest in society at large, though he always preferered to see this larger entity reflected in the smaller.
- Which led to the very particular shomin genre ("home-life"), the class that was most typically Japanese and at the same time formed the larger part of his audience. (Note that as his audience grew more affluent after the war, so did his characters!)
- Found in children a vehicle for his ideas, in particular for the kind of social satire he was now developing.
- Gradually limited his technical means, giving up fades, dissolves, etc. and eventually creating a plain style that was superbly suited to his mundane subject matter.
- At the same time, Ozu was a commercial director. His films were intended to make money while showing life as he saw it. For this reason he made many films we consider atypical of his work. It was later that he gained control and was able to make only the films he wanted to make (Richie, p. 208).
The short clip is tantalizing. We can only imagine how good the entire picture must have been.
- It begins with Bunkichi (Saitô Tatsuo) sitting on a bench overlooking the city next to small boy, around ten years old. As a policeman looks on, the kid puts a butterfly net over Bunkichi's head and then peels off his fake moustache. Possibly for the benefit of the watching policeman, Bunkichi makes a game of it and sticks the moustache on the kid, who immediately takes it off and puts it back on the side of Bunkichi's face. He slaps the kid a few times, who then begins to cry. An intertitle looks like it might say something like, "ooh, that hurt; ooh, that hurt!" [the Japanese is repeated] ...
- As he tries to console the boy, the imp again rips off his fake moustache. End of clip.
- The 57-minute film was reportedly shot in three days.
13. Kekkongaku nyûmon (Marriage for Beginners) (1/5/30) (ca. 107 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Husband and wife tire of their mutual life.
14. Hogaraka ni ayume (Walk Cheerfully) (3/1/30) (ca. 100 min.) [Silent B&W {acc. to Richie,16mm finegrain master with Shochiku, but the film has never been commercially released to my knowledge -- clip of 2:57 here}]
A young delinquent eventually reforms.
- Apparently everything about this film is extremely "Americanized."
- The clip shows two different cars with two different sets of people travelling parallel to a train (which we also see). In one vehicle, a man picks up an old doll from the side of the road and then later throws it out the window. In the other vehicle, a man's hat goes out the window (twice).
- Note the reuse of the crib notes on the shirt cuff (see Days of Youth, above).
- Chishu Ryu apparently has an important role in this one. He soon became aware, according to Richie, that he was playing Ozu's alter-ego [p. 210].
- The clip is astonishing! It begins with the man tending to his child, then cuts to a woman who is holding a man at gunpoint with two guns!
- In this short scene, Ozu holds the tension high with quite a bit of cutting and a wide variety of shots, including several close-ups obviously intended to jar and ratchet up the suspense.
- The prisoner looks at his pocket watch. It reads 1:50 (presumably A.M.). A FTB and up on a wall clock which reads 3:07. Long slow pans follow, finally revealing the husband working to soothe his sick child.
- The wife is getting sleepy. A wonderful ECU on the man's hand, lightly tapping the chair; later the same on his shoes.
- A poster on the wall has the names Sally O'Neil and Jack Egan. An IMDb paired-search reveals that they made two films together: Mad Hour (1928) and Broadway Scandals (1929).The poster probably is for the latter, since it pictures dancing flapper-girls in a chorus line ...
- In a beautiful sequence, the camera slowly pans left past some hanging laundry (a future "pillow-shot" motif that will appear in nearly all of Ozu's later films!) and many other objects, the camera suddenly moves outside where we see a boy with a cart delivering milk (it is morning). As the boy and his cart leave the frame, the shot pretty much perfectly reverses itself -- the pan is now going to the right and when we finally land on woman, she is asleep. She awakes with a start and Ozu quickly reverses the shot to the show the man holding the two guns. She is frantic.
- As the clip ends, she is trying to run away -- he is talking to her, and puts the guns into his pants pockets.
- A more detailed summary appears on the primary Ozu site:
- Okajima, a college student with invincible kendo swordfighting skills, both vexes and amuses women with his conservative ways and his big, brushy beard which he carries with pride. One day, on his way to his friend Baron Yukimoto's party, he rescues the demure Hiroko from a brazen swindler, Satoko. He goes to Hiroko's company for a job interview and is rejected. Hiroko suggest that he shave off his beard and he at once lands a job, and attracts the attention of both Yukimoto's sister and Satoko. But his heart is set on Hiroko, and despite some mix-up with Satoko, their faith in each other is unshaken.
- Richie: Some who remember seeing this film say it was not as bad as it sounds. Ozu, however, said that he wanted to make a nice, light picture, got too earnest about it, and it turned out slovenly.
Ozu's 22nd film -- but only the second film in chronological availability!
A serious comedy about a married salaried man who loses his job and must walk the streets in search of one. He has many misadventures, some of them painfully comic, before being saved by his old school comrades.
- This excellent Eclipse release also includes "I Was Born, But..." (1932) and "Passing Fancy" (1933).
- All three films feature a dazzling, period-correct, optional solo piano soundtrack score by Donald Sosin. The music enhances Ozu's film throughout every scene and makes watching it a much deeper and richer experience. Be sure to click the "Activate Score" icon...
- The opening Shochiku logo is strange indeed. A stylized cityscape is bestraddled by a giant nude man in bas-relief, with the year (1931) superimposed.
- Towards the very end of the film, there is an excellent example of the way Ozu used all the principal elements of filmmaking -- script, shooting and editing -- to achieve the kind of magical effect he does here. (Richie's excellent book is laid out in exactly that fashion -- chapters on Script, Shooting and Editing, followed by the Filmography.)
- SCRIPT: In this instance, there are no title cards, although the adults seem to speak to each other occasionally. What they say could not have been important. What the script probably said was something like:
- The family sits in a circle playing the game. The children are oblivious to any emotions other than fun and happiness, but the adults exchange stealthy glances of sadness and confusion as they become aware and profoundly affected, experiencing the reality and the beauty of life.
- SHOOTING: There are just four camera positions: 1) a medium-shot of the four from behind and slightly to the left of son, and then (clockwise) daughter, Mom and Dad; 2) a CU of the kids; 3) MCU of Dad w/son on lower left; and 4) MCU of Mom w/daughter on lower left.
- This scene plays with the emotional responses of Mom and Dad in positions #3 and #4, above.
- EDITING: There are 22 cuts in 1:48. Note the length of each cut and how it creates an overall rhythmic flow to the scene. SU# indicates the camera setup, above. [#] is the length of the cut, in seconds:
- Cut 1/SU#1 [11]: As son and Mom walk back to complete the circle, son sits directly in front and slightly to the left of the camera, with his sister, Mom and Dad completing the circle, clockwise. They join hands and begin to clap and sing. Neutral faces.
- Cut 2/SU#2 [5] A close two-shot of the kids, smiling happy...
- Cut 3/SU#3 [3] MCU on Dad w/son on lower left; Dad's putting on a happy face;
- Cut 4/SU#4 [4] MCU on Mom w/daughter on lower left; Also trying to look happy. She looks up at her husband...
- Cut 5/SU#3 [3] Dad hesitates for a moment, looks at Mom;
- Cut 6/SU#4 [5] Mom, concerned.
- Cut 7/SU#3 [5] Dad, stiff.
- Cut 8/SU#4 [3] Mom, sad; her lips move for a moment;
- Cut 9/SU#3 [2] Dad, clapping mechanically;
- Cut 10/SU#4 [5] Mom, slowly bowing her head, but still clapping;
- Cut 11/SU#3 [5] Dad, now choking back emotion...
- Cut 12/SU#4 [3] Mom, swallowing hard.
- Cut 13/SU#3 [3] Dad, steely-eyed, staring at his wife...
- Cut 14/SU#4 [4] Mom, missing several claps to wipe away tears;
- Cut 15/SU#3 [6] Dad, also missing, holding it all in. At the end of the cut, you can see he is looking at his children:
- Cut 16/SU#2 [4] The kids, absorbed in the movements and happy feeling...
- Cut 17/SU#3 [4] Dad, humble, thankful, on the verge of tears;
- Cut 18/SU#4 [3[ Mom, slowly looks up;
- Cut 19/SU#3 [8] Dad, his smile spread over his family -- a relatively long cut -- and he is speaking with great emotion;
- Cut 20/SU#4 [4] Mom, too, is happy now, at last.
- Cut 21/SU#2 [7] The beautiful children -- still happy, playful, in tune with the rhythm -- but do I see a glint of wonder and curiosity about their parents' behavior? Bottom line, they are happy.
- Cut 22/SU#1 [10] Long cut which fades out as the family plays together at peace.
- SU#2 is used only three times -- cuts #2, 16 and 21. Note the powerful effect of those three cuts!
- SCRIPT: In this instance, there are no title cards, although the adults seem to speak to each other occasionally. What they say could not have been important. What the script probably said was something like:
- I call that filmic poetry. Eventually, every scene in an Ozu film will be that stunning!
- A more detailed look...
23. Haru wa gofujin kara (Spring Comes from the Ladies) (1/29/32) (ca. 94 min.) [Silent B&W NEP]
Through the eyes of two young boys (eight and ten), Ozu explores the loss of innocence as they gradually realize that their father is not the "boss" -- and since they can beat up the boss's son, they simply do not understand why their dad doesn't rule the roost, as well. They go on a hunger strike, but eventually realize that life seems to hold many cold and bitter truths.
- According to a Japanese friend, a fuller translation of the title might be something like:
- I Was Born, But ... why do I have to go through all this hardship?
- Shot between November '31 and April '32, but interrupted by the shooting of the previous film (#23).
- This partially accounts for the way the film turns dark towards the end -- Ozu's attitude toward it had changed...
- Ozu: "I started to make a film about children and ended up with a film about grown-ups; while I had originally planned to make a fairly bright little story, it changed while I was working on it, and came out very dark. The company hadn't thought it would turn out this way. They were so unsure of it that they delayed its release for two months." [Richie, p. 215.]
- The film went on to win the Kinema Jumpo First Prize for that year.
- Donald Sosin again composes and plays one of the finest silent film scores I've ever heard.
- The first Shochiku card resembles the one in Tokyo Chorus -- a bas-relief; a tall figure with a staff next to a lion with 1932 across its body.
- The background for the credit cards is hilarious: a man is standing at the base of three leaves extending from a stalk. He has on funny round glasses and is naked, covering his privates with his left hand.
- The first card reads: "A Picture Book for Grown-Ups"
- Original story by "James Maki." This was a name they made up for Ozu.
- A more detailed look...
The shooting of I Was Born, But ... was interrupted when one of the children was hurt and this film was hastily prepared. Four boys have graduated college. Three of them eventually have to ask the fourth , the son of a company president, for jobs. He, in turn, gets one of their girls.
- The clip features Saitô Tatsuo and has a clean, bright look to it.
Ozu's first sound film; albeit music and effects only (no dialogue).
An atypical story, a romantic melodrama about a prostitute in love with a boy whose father dislikes her; it takes place during the night before the young man must leave or the army.
A girl works hard to put her younger brother through school only to have him kill himself when he learns that she has financed his education by becoming a prostitute.
- Filmed in eight days.
- The clip is of the opening of the film, almost eight minutes in length.
- In the first scene, the sister and brother are at home where she gives him money for school tuition.
- In the second scene, the sister is at her office, typing. A policeman meets with her bosses, who praise her work. They mention the professor for whom she translates, "late into the night." The policeman takes note.
Tokiko leads a double-life as an office typist and the mistress of a retired champion boxer and small-time ringleader named Jyoji. Hiroshi, a new recruit to the gang, hero worships Jyoji and neglects his studies. Hiroshi's sister Kazuko begs Jyoji to spare her brother from their shady dealings, but inadvertently casts a spell on Jyoji. After several reversals, Jyoji returns to Tokiko's arms. They decide to come clean, but not before pulling one last job to help Hiroshi and Kazuko.
- The DVD requires a region-free player.
- Like Days of Youth, there is no soundtrack -- try and imagine the music (and the benshi).
- This is the only surviving Ozu pic in the "gangster" genre.
- Kinuyo Tanaka, is wonderful as Tokiko. If you only have seen her in the Mizoguchi masterpieces, this film affords a great opportunity to see how she developed as an actress from the silent era.
- The single gunshot in all the films of Ozu!
