The Best American Poetry

On Beethoven's String Quartet in C# Minor, Op. 131 and seeing the trailer for the film "A Late Quartet" by Lewis Saul

The composer Lewis Saul was prompted to write to us about the current movie release "A Late Quartet" and his reaction to the trailer.  Lewis had earlier written about the Beethoven String Quartet in C Minor, the subject of the film and one of his most beloved pieces of music.

December 17, 2012:

I have not yet seen the entire film. Watching this trailer, I wonder how many of you -- trained musicians or not -- can tell that the actors are "faking" it? Does it bother you?

Obviously, good directors do everything they can to "shield" the audience from seeing this sort of thing -- but as a musician, and IN PARTICULAR -- as someone who considers this marvelous piece of music to be one of the most sublime compositions ever created by human spirit, I am hoping it won't ruin any part of the film for me!

With that in mind, I thought folks who have already seen the film might enjoy reading my post on this unbelievably potent and heavenly work. Or read my post, then go see the film.

I still cannot believe they made a movie about the Great Opus 131, and I can't wait to see it. Soap opera and everything."

Here's Lewis's original post from July 12, 2010: Op. 131:

The Seven Most Meaningful Compositions That I Will Love Forever -- II. BEETHOVEN: String Quartet in C# Minor, Op. 131 (1825)

 It was forty years ago today ...

 

No, that can't be right -- it just sounded nice! But it was like 39 or so -- and it was Paris -- a Montparnasse cafe in fact and it was raining lightly (probably) and I knew a poet (definitely) who expressed his unreserved enthusiasm for Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, Op. 125 -- particularly the final movement, the "Ode To Joy," where Beethoven unleashes all the forces at his disposal, including vocal soloists and chorus.

I tried to explain to this poet how Beethoven -- using only the simplest and most basic harmonic structure (think two-chord rock 'n roll) -- spins the earth around with powerful orchestration and unbelievablly brilliant variation in color and temperment ...

... but the best part was that this particular poet taught me the meaning of the German words which I had never really taken the trouble to learn.

Muß ein lieber vater wohnen means a lot more to me now thanks to this wonderful poet friend who turned me on to James Joyce, playfully informed me that Joan Miró was not a woman -- and had the good sense to bring Frank Zappa along as the soundtrack to our local hysteria ...

**

Much like his musical output as a whole, Beethoven’s 17 string quartets can be divided into three convenient periods: Early, Middle and Late.

Early: Opus 18, Nos. 1-6, all written between 1798-1800;
Middle: Opus 59, Nos. 1-3 (1805/6); Op. 74, the “Harp” (1809), and Op. 95 (1810);
Late: Op. 127, 130, 131, 132, 133, 135 (1823-26) 

I cannot recall when I first heard a Late Beethoven quartet. It must have been my senior year of high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy, where my composition teacher had pointed me towards the microfiche machine and a few spools of microfilm which contained the Complete Works of Beethoven! How I used to pour over those beautiful scores, surfing the microfilm the way we do the net today -- carefully studying these (mostly) unfamiliar scores.

After thoroughly absorbing the Late Quartets, I began to feel a particular fondness and appreciation of Op. 131 -- not that the others are not equally brilliant and exciting, world-shaking music -- but 131 became a focal point for my idea about what it means to write for these four stringed instruments …

~~

HOW I BECAME SUCH A HUGE AMADEUS FAN

I have 15 or 20 different recordings of the string quartets. The Amadeus Quartet recordings from the 1960’s -- recently reissued on CD -- are my favorites, by far! 

I still have the original 10-LP DGG set and listen to it often, marveling at how much better analog vinyl sounds than squeezy-thin dynamic range and contrast CDs. I’ve never heard better performances -- particular the Late Quartets.

Unlike most quartets with a famous name, who routinely replace departing players (“Juilliard,” “Tokyo,” “Turtle Island”), The Amadeus Quartet had always agreed that “ … if any member could no longer play, for whatever reason, the Quartet would not continue” -- and when Peter Schidlof, the violist, died in 1987, The Amadeus Quartet disbanded. 

I had the good fortune to hear the Tokyo Quartet play this here in Tucson in April of 2008. My review of that performance is here.

HOW FIVE BECAME SIX AND OTHER DETAILS

Op. 133 (“Grosse Fuge”) was originally the last movement of Op. 130. Shockingly, Beethoven listened to reason and his publisher and agreed to replace the mammoth movement with a light dance movement (one of the very last things he ever wrote!), which now stands as the Finale to Op. 130.

Op. 133 was published separately -- although more and more quartets today are playing this as the Finale of Op. 130, a strange historic reconstruction … 

What makes these late quartets so special?

First of all, if you are familiar with the Ninth (Op. 125) and/or the Missa Solemnis (Op. 123) or the Diabelli Variations (Op. 120), you already know that his style and perhaps even his fundamental musical language had changed dramatically from his output of the previous decade or so.

But the string quartet being the intimate, ultimate form for any composer (true today, methinx), Beethoven seems to have deliberately set out to not only “change” music -- but to revolutionize it!

Briefly, the other Late Quartets:

Op. 127 (Eb Major). The “Eroica” (or “heroic”) key! The quartet begins with massed tonics (seven or eight notes played by four) going to dominant seventh chords in -- respectively -- second and third inversions -- all leading to a quick transition to a delightful, slippery Allegro trip in ¾ time, which ends simply. The second movement is an astonishing series of variations on a simple, rising theme in Ab Major. The notes become blacker and blacker (faster rhythms) as the movement progresses, modulating to E Major a few times, before a beautiful ending; simplicity itself. The third movement (“Scherzando vivace”) is the usual jocular Beethoven, but in this Late period, the joke is a bit bizarre and otherworldly -- particularly in the Trio, which sweeps by like a witch on a broomstick. The Finale is a regular rondo-type 4th movement -- but the theme has a very bizarre (“Late”) element to it -- the Ab changing to an A-natural after two repetitions:

Op. 130 (Bb Major). Not only did Beethoven search out new sounds and explore novel harmonic territory, but he obviously felt constrained by the typical four-movement form (Op. 127, for example). Here he burst forth with six separate movements!

I. Adagio - Allegro. A wonderful example of beginning with a fairly typical sonata-form type of exposition and quickly changing key and mood (there are some major seventh chords in this section which are astonishingly beautiful for 1826 or anytime!)

II. Presto. A thrilling fun ride. Beethoven screws with your head as he jumps from duple to triple meter;

III. Andante. Gradually increases in intensity until it fairly busts apart at the end!

IV. Alla danza tedesca. A light joyful dance -- four voices in perfect balance;

V. Cavatina -- Adagio. This short movement is rightfully proclaimed a mini-masterpiece. The middle section (Beklemmt [“anguished”]) is positively 20th-century sounding!

VI. Finale. A bouncy happy replacement for what used to be a massive double-fugue (see below).

Op. 132 (A Minor). Beethoven makes do with only five movements in this soul-shaking masterpiece. That he opens with a low G# (the “leading tone” to A, the tonic) on the cello was in itself a revolutionary thing to do -- but Beethoven pushes the form to its limits in these quartets. Here -- as in 130 and many other late, and even early and middle works -- he moves back and forth between slow and fast. A Minor is a “dark” key -- and he ends the movement with the first violin sawing back and forth on the same E on two different strings. The second movement (A Major, ¾) also begins on a G#! The trio uses the first violin’s A string to make a bagpipes-type sound. Then follows the famous “Lydian” hymn of thanksgiving, a march and a dazzling ¾ Allegro appasionato to close things out.

Op. 133 (Bb Major). This massive double-fugue which must be heard to be believed. There is a massive amount of ink, virtual and real, spilled over this masterpiece. One of my favorites is here.

Op. 135 (F Major). Famously, Beethoven “prefaced” the music with actual musical notation (which does not appear in the actual work itself) from a goofy canon he had written several months earlier. (Beethoven wrote many such canons. Some are very funny.) 

Thus, we are given an unusual visual clue to what was on Beethoven’s mind! The final movement literally explodes with these questions. Must it be? Yep? Etc.

 OPUS 131 in C# Minor (39:17)

1. Adagio, ma non troppo e molto espressivo -- attacca: (6:58)
2. Allegro molto vivace -- attacca: (3:05)
3. Allegro moderato -- attacca: (0:56)
4. Andante, ma non troppo e molto cantabile -- Andante moderato e lusinghiero -- Adagio -- Allegretto -- Adagio, ma non troppo e semplice -- Allegretto (14:17)
5. Presto -- Molto poco adagio -- attacca: (5:27)
6. Adagio quasi un poco andante -- attacca: (2:04)
7. Allegro (6:30)

No one had ever written a string quartet in seven movements before!

The word “attacca” means that the players proceed directly to the next movement without pause. Therefore, a listener with no program might conclude that the piece is in two very long movements! (The only pause occurs after the fourth movement).

In fact, the quartet is really in five moments -- Nos. 3 and 6 are really just short introductions to Nos. 4 and 7, respectively.

1. Adagio, ma non troppo e molto espressivo -- attacca: (6:58)

A fugue of unsurpassed beauty, intensity, majesty -- and of course, inventiveness! The first violin (notation above) opens with the dominant note (G#) which lands on the leading tone (B#), followed by the tonic (C#).

The fourth note (the first beat of the second full bar) dips down to the submediant (A) and is held for three beats -- almost like a divine sigh -- before it continues on its way towards the second entry in the second violin, played a fifth lower. The texture thickens magnificently as the viola enters back in the tonic and the cello follows, again a fifth lower. With much typical fugal imitation, the music continues along, moved steadily by the quarter-note pulse, surging towards something.

Using an enharmonic (D#/Eb), he modulates to six flats; nine bars later to G# Minor (eighth-notes are introduced), and then to A Major, where we then encounter the First and Second violins in a delicious duet:

Soon, the pulse picks up again (more eighth-notes); the theme is heard in various disguises; and then the sun seems to set:

This gorgeous, peaceful ending is actually no ending at all!

Beethoven immediately repeats the octave skip, but a half-step higher, as he moves to D Major for the

2. Allegro molto vivace -- attacca: (3:05)

second movement -- a delightful romp in 6/8. Beethoven at first holds back a bit with a fermata and ritard, but eventually the quartet shouts out a slippery bit of off-beat sforzandi in unison much of the time -- until the music simply dies away …  

3. Allegro moderato -- attacca: (0:56)

This quick transitional movement features a wonderful run in the first violin:

…



















and ends on a nice loud dominant chord.

4. Andante, ma non troppo e molto cantabile -- Andante moderato e lusinghiero -- Adagio -- Allegretto -- Adagio, ma non troppo e semplice -- Allegretto (14:17)

This massive theme and variations begins with a theme which speaks to simplicity itself. There is barely anything to it.

A long passionate section follows and transforms itself with dotted rhythms and a sweeping lick (a 16th and two 32nds) until concluding with a light flurry of 32nd notes leading right into a 4/4 march variation.

"If you love steak, you can love chicken, too!" An exchange between Jamie Katz and Lewis Saul

(ed note:  Lewis Saul's tribute to Dave Brubeck, who died last week, prompted this affectionate exchange between Jamie Katz and Lew, two musicians who know their stuff.  I thought it worth highlighting since both raise important points. A big thank-you as well to Jamie for turning me on to Lionel Loueke, whom I've been listening to with much pleasure.  Check him out! -- sdh)

December 11, 2012:

Lewis—
Thank you for this wonderful essay. Of course, as you know, you were the one who turned me on to what I still call the odd meters—how to hear them and think about them. Now we have artists such as Lionel Loueke routinely playing complex rhythms without any strain or feeling of unnaturalness and creating grooves that cook like 4/4. (You can go a whole week in New York jazz clubs without hearing 4/4 these days.) Loueke—who is originally from Benin—is a favorite of mine. After hearing him play at the Jazz Gallery in Manhattan a few years ago, I asked him if growing up with West African music had nourished his liking for polyrhythmic grooves and meters like 19/8. And he said, actually, it was more about Bartók and Stravinsky. I think possibly he said that to ward off any assumptions he thought I might have been making about his musical sophistication being "native." Black musicians have been dealing with that insulting assumption for a long time.

It took me a long time to come around to Brubeck. His popularity got in my way, as did the odd meters and my feeling that other pianists from his generation—such as Tommy Flanagan, Hank Jones, Ahmad Jamal and Bill Evans—were more deserving of acclaim. But that's stupid. As you also taught me, if you love steak, you can love chicken, too! I'm terribly glad I got to hear Brubeck when I could still enjoy him live, as I did at Damrosch Park in Lincoln Center three years ago. He was joyful! (And his alto player, Bobby Militello, is a motherfucker!)I was also influenced by stories I heard about Brubeck. When he became the first jazz artist on the cover of Time magazine, in 1954, he apologized (unnecessarily, but still appropriately) to Duke Ellington. And then there was the deeply moving clip Ken Burns included in his "Jazz" series. Brubeck, who grew up on a cattle ranch and served in Patton's Third Army during the war, was talking about racism.

“The first black man that I [ever] saw, my dad took me to see on the Sacramento River in California," Brubeck said. "And he said to his friend, ‘Open your shirt for Dave.’ ”

“There was a brand on his chest," Brubeck said, breaking down as he shared his horror, still fresh in mind some 60 years later. “And my dad said, ‘These things can’t happen.’ That’s why I fought for what I fought for.”

Brubeck was a mensch: a fine pianist, a beautiful composer, a musician's musician who somehow kept it going for generations, a generous friend and teacher—and a humble man, too.

I am grateful that you spent time with him, and have shared some of his goodness with me and many others.

-- Jamie Katz

December 12, 2012:

Jamie, you nailed two very important points.

First, Bartok and Stravinsky were doing things in odd meters in the first two decades of the 20th century -- at least 40 years before "Take Five."

What Bartok and Stravinsky is (obviously) infinitely more complex than ANY Brubeck tune ~ but Dave studied that music with Milhaud (who's no slouch with time sigs, either!) and TRANSMORGIFIED that dynamic to the jazz slash pop-music world -- and he did it with elan, polish and style.

And you were right (and brave) to admit that many many black pianists were ignored in the 60's while Dave basked in his Time Magazine cover glory. I think he felt much the same way as you did. He LOVED those guys and was most likely slightly embarrassed by all the (white)-media attention...

One more great example:

Check out Paul Simon's THE TEACHER from his CD "You're the One." In ELEVEN (6+5), but it sounds so perfectly natural and flowing that no one would think of it as an "odd" meter.

That's what I meant by following, but "trying to make sense of the past."

--Lewis

December 12, 2012:

One more salient point:

TAKE FIVE was recorded over a period of several weeks ~ perhaps 20-30 hours for composition, recording and editing.

TRUTH IS FALLEN (how many of you readers have ever heard it? [The LP is Out Of Print and there is no CD]).

Dave probably spent nearly 1,000 hours composing, COPYING (!), and rehearsing the massive combined forces for the performances and recordings.

The disconnect between "good" jazz and "this-is-good-for-you" classical is a deep, uncrossable chasm.

LS

Thank you, Dave. bang! plop! crash! (Remembering Dave Brubeck) by Lew Saul

I escaped the public school system and spent my senior year of high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy in northern Michigan, where I met 50% of the Brubeck kids – Kathy and Danny were both at the Academy and Chris, who had just graduated. Danny and I became good friends.

Dave was visiting his kids and attended my Senior Recital on Thursday, May 7, 1970. The first half of my graduation requirement consisted of three “classical” works: a solo flute piece, a piano trio and a string quartet. The second half consisted of three pieces I wrote for the jazz band – or as it was called at IAA, “The Studio Orchestra.”

The last work on the programme – FINALE – consisted of a frenzied accumulation of bebop jazz clichés and harmonies which gradually settled down into a 5/4 groove in which I quoted the “Interlochen Theme.”

I met Dave Brubeck right after the recital. He asked me if he could look at the scores, which I had created with my specially-nibbed ozalid pen, black ink and my drafting tools – the way we notated music in the olden days, ya know?
He seemed very impressed with my manuscripts, and asked me if I would come to work for him that summer, and copy the score to his latest orchestral work, TRUTH IS FALLEN (Atlantic Records, OOP, write your congressman and tell him to release it on CD already!)

I had already made a commitment to work at Interlochen that summer, but it ended in early August and he said that was fine with him.

I arrived at the mansion in Connecticut and we immediately went to work.

An early breakfast was always the highlight of the day. Iola, Danny, nine-year-old Matthew and I listened to Dave’s incredible stories about EVERYTHING – the early days on the road; his refusal to play in clubs that would not admit blacks (one such story moved the entire breakfast table to tears); Lena Horne; and his studies with Darius Milhaud, which was particularly fascinating for me. [Months later, my studies at Juilliard were interrupted when I was nearly killed by a drunk driver. When I got out of the hospital and made my way back to New York, Dave asked me to come visit. It was now the second semester and because I had started in advanced classes (third-year theory, for instance), it would not have made any sense for me to return to Juilliard at that time. Dave picked up the phone and called Milhaud who suggested I go to France to study. A few days later I was living in Paris, studying with Nadia Boulanger.]

Then we went to work, walking down the ramp by the waterfall to the sunken music room. Dave’s record collection – around 10,000, it seemed to me – was stacked in high shelves above the pianos.

I sat at my drafting table while Dave sat at the piano and the process began. I was constantly surprised and honored at Dave’s interaction with me vis-à-vis my “classical” education – and I was consistently encouraged to express ideas and concerns about orchestration, particularly the problem of balancing a large symphony orchestra, chorus and vocal soloists, with … a ROCK BAND! (New Heavenly Blue, Chris’s band, which had recorded an LP for RCA Records.)

**

The human body is tuned to 4/4 time. We march, left-right, left-right. We sing:

(1)     EENIE (2) MEENIE (3) MIENIE (4) MO
(1)     CATCH A (2) TIGER (3) BY THE (4) TOE
(1)     IF HE (2) HOLLERS (3) LET HIM (4) GO

Now try:


(1)     EENIE (2) MEENIE (3) MIENIE (4) MO (5) bang!
(1)     CATCH A (2) TIGER (3) BY THE (4) TOE (5) plop!
(2)     (1) IF HE HOLLERS (3) LET HIM (4) GO (5) crash!

You are now in 5/4!

Try putting the 5th beat in some other place within the phrase and you alter the accents; and further, subdivide the beats into 10 units instead of 5 (1/8th notes) and you can see how delicious you can make an unusual rhythm sound!

On one of the most exciting days of my life, Dave and I were discussing the meter of SEVEN, which is usually subdivided into either 3+4 or 4+3. You set up the rhythm and the melody fits into either of those patterns.

I bravely and nervously invited him into my guest room where I had my KLH record player set up – and put on Frank Zappa’s “Legend of the Golden Arches” from UNCLE MEAT. Zappa’s 7 rolls over barlines, twisting and turning over an ostinato which continually plays with 7/8 – 7/4 paradigm (making two bars of 7/8 into one bar of 7/4).

His nose wrinkled at the electric “noise” – but I could tell he was impressed!

That’s what pioneers do. Others follow and try to make sense out of the past.

Personally, in my own world, I hear nearly everything in SEVEN or NINE or ELEVEN (6/8 + 5/8) …

Thank you, Dave. bang! plop! crash!

Beethoven and My Father

My father Joseph Lehman was born today in Furth, Germany, ninety-nine years ago. Ludwig Van Beethoven was born in Bonn on the same date in 1770. When my father had his fatal heart attack in December 1971, I flew home from Paris, where I was studying, arriving too late to see him alive one last time. The fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth, not only the major theme but the entire movement, from instrumentals through vocals, from development to coda, went through my mind in the following days. I could hear the singing at the funeral, at the cemetery, at home, and in the sickbed that awaited me in Paris upon my return there weeks later. I didn't know then that my father and Ludwig Van shared a birthday. In Paris, Ludwig Van Saul and I spent hours listening to to a recording of the symphony, he doing his best to educate me. Two friends form that time remember my saying, of my father, that he was "a holy man." I believe it. That was also the year I read Dostoyevski, and my head was full of Raskolnikov, the gambler, the Karamazovs, and certain saintly fools. -- DL 

 

Ozu7 by Lewis Saul

*52. Akibiyori (Late Autumn) (11/13/60) (125 min.) [Sound Color] [buy it here]

A girl lives with her mother. Though she has had opportunities to marry, she refused, preferring to stay at home. The widowed mother, however, feels that her daughter is sacrificing herself and attempts to find her a suitable husband. The daughter opposes this until she comes to believe, mistakenly, that her mother is motivated by a desire to remarry. The mother goes back to the apartment and begins her life alone.

• From the Late Ozu set on Eclipse.
• A remake of Late Spring with the mother threatening to remarry rather than the father.
• Three men make up an important unit in this film -- all splendid actors completely at ease with the Ozu style:
  • Mamiya (Shin Saburi)
  • Taguchi (Nubuo Nakamura)
  • Hirayama (Ryuji Kita)

As previously mentioned, sound (1936) and color (1958) were just two additional tools which Ozu used to create his masterpieces. In this instance, Ozu wants to take us from the memorial service to the post-service eating and drinking. Notice the number of pillow shots (six, more than usual) and how sound and color serve his purposes.

Also, note how this film uses green throughout, similar to the way he used red in Equinox Flower and Good Morning.

• Mamiya is late for the service. He finds his way through the various rooms into the main room and joins his friends (who have saved a spot for him). 
• 0:09:03: He completes a medium three-shot as he kneels next to Hirayama. (Sound: Bhuddist chanting) Taguchi: "You're late."
  • Mamiya: "Yes, a bit."
  • Hirayama: "It just started."
  • Mamiya: "Then I'm too early."

Ozu6 by Lewis Saul

In 1951, Keisuke Kinoshita's Carmen Comes Home became the first Japanese film in color. Two years later, Kinugasa's Gate of Hell became an international hit. Ozu did not like the way red turned out on Eastman Kodak film. It wasn't until he was satisfied with the Agfa red looked that he proceeded to make a color film.

Kurosawa waited even longer. In his first color film, Dodesukaden, made in 1970, he was so dissatisfied with the way "reality" looked that he painted most of the sets with loud, garish colors so as to mute the harsh natural colors of his locations. Five years later, Dersu Uzala was made in beautiful 70mm widescreen; and finally in 1980 and 1985 we get the splendid gorgeous colors of Kagemusha and Ran.

And so the rainbow bursts ... 

*49. Higanbana (Equinox Flower) (9/7/58) (118 min.) [Sound Color] [buy it here]

A daughter wishes to marry the man of her choice, but her father objects. Her mother understands her feelings, however, as does her friend from Kyoto. Eventually, the father is won over.

• From the Late Ozu set on Eclipse.
• The credits themselves are gorgeous to look at -- bright red, white and black lettering.
• This is a large ensemble with a fantastic cast. The president of Shochiku himself more or less ordered Ozu to make this film in color to show off their latest beauty, Fujiko Yamamoto (Yukiko, daughter of Hatsu Sasaki [Chieko Naniwa]).
• Interestingly, Ozu doesn't give her the star role of Setsuko (Ineko Arima), but that of Yukiko, Setsuko's mirror image character ...
• Nothing has changed in Ozu's basic style, other than the complete elimination of any camera movement -- even pans and dolly shots. These introductory pillow shots are typical -- yet in color, they seem to visually reverberate with weight:
  • 0:03:00: The railway station, clock at 2:50 PM.
  • 0:03:09: Wider view
  • 0:03:16: The automatic timetable which we've seen so frequently in the past few B&W films
  • 0:03:25: A wedding party; beautiful clothes
• 0:03:31: Two porters, sitting on a bench taking a break. They're rating all the brides they've seen this day.
• 0:04:18: This is the first shot we have of the wedding, but Ozu has already started the sound of a monk chanting during the last cut -- a transition shot of the railway ...

Ozu5 by Lewis Saul

*45. Ochazuke no aji (Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice) (10/1/52) (115 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]

A middle-aged, middle-class couple experience a crisis in their marriage. With no children to create a bond, married life has lost its meaning in routine. They both attempt to improve and hence create a stronger marriage.

• All-regions DVD.
• This somewhat unusual film is sandwiched between two great masterpieces, Early Summer and Tokyo Story. Hopefully this pic is being considered as a Criterion Collection candidate. It is not in the same league as the above-mentioned films, but it is a very good film.
• Ozu pulled this script out of the drawer -- it is the same one that the Japanese censors rejected in 1941. The Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family took its place.
• In the original script, the husband was going off to war. "Rather than the customary rich ceremonial food, they decide on a dish that is among the most simple, the most Japanese. It was to have been a gentle, intimate, reflective film, filled with observations of Japanese character in times of stress" (Richie, p. 227).
• Obviously, the script had to be radically altered in this 1952 version. The husband is going to Uruguay on business instead of going off to fight the Americans. The simple dinner happens as a reconciliation between a quarrelling couple.
• Nevertheless, the denouement here always brings tears to my eyes.
• Shin Saburi (Mokichi) is quite good as this rather subdued character. He made four other films with Ozu.
• Michiyo Kogure (Taeko) likewise, who is here asked to make a fairly major character transformation. This is rare in Ozu -- most characters never go through such dramatic changes. This is her only appearance in an Ozu film.
• Keiko Tsushima (Setsuko) also makes her only Ozu appearance.
• The score is by Ichirô Saitô -- 147 IMDb credits! He scored two other Ozu films (Record of a Tenement Gentleman [1947] and The Munekata Sisters [1950]) as well as three great Mizoguchi masterpieces, Life of Oharu (1952), Ugetsu (1953) and A Geisha (1953).
• His score here is very fitting. Like the film, it moves and sweeps and is certainly more upbeat than most Ozu scores.
• For example, the overture, played over the opening credits, is most unusual for an Ozu film, containing dramatic ups and downs, big crescendi, deceptive cadences -- until it finally settles on a major chord -- pause -- (director's credit) -- he puts the third of the chord on top ...
• Taeko and Setsuko are in a big touring car (jaunty, almost jazzy piano)

Some outstanding moments:

• Aya, the "modern girl" (Chikage Awashima) owns her own dress shop.
• 0:08:27: Aya and Taeko have hatched a conspiracy to go away -- girls only -- to a spa. Taeko calls her husband at work, ready to lie to him, but he isn't there. Where is he? Ozu shows us his empty desk ("Machinery Dept.") ...
• 0:08:34: The workplace; filing cabinets, backs of men working, windows ...
• 0:08:42: Through a window, looking down on the street ...
• 0:08:50: Sign: "Echo Bar" ...
• 0:08:58: Man drinking -- but it's not Mokichi, it's his friend, Noboru (Koji Tsuruta) ...
• 0:09:19: Mokichi arrives.

 The characters sing a lot in this film:

• 0:11:29: Noboru sings, Mokichi keeps time with his fingers ...
• 0:22:11: Aya begins a song at the spa ...
• 0:44:21: Ryu sings a wartime song ...

Ozu wants to take us into the Satake home from the previous bar scene.

• 0:12:02: Left of frame: a cabinet; right, a table, a few cups. Ozu gently pulls back the camera just a wee bit to take in the room ... then we follow the maid through the house as she brings a tray to Taeko ...
• 0:13:23: As usual, there is a mirror for the previous camera movement. Now he moves it gently forward, following the couple down a hallway ...
• 0:17:57: Camera fixed outside train -- in this film, these shots have flashier impact than in other films. The telephone poles and bridge supports seem to barely miss hitting the camera! (another great train shot occurs at 1:22:14.)
• 0:21:35: At the spa, Taeko lies to her husband on the telephone. She hangs up on him and then immediately picks up the receiver again, and -- thinking she is talking to the operator -- says, "More sake, please." She realizes he is still on the line. The women don't make much of it -- but "Mr. Thick-head" would certainly have figured that one out. (In the end, we learn that he knew exactly what his wife was doing.)
• 0:32:18: More parallel camera movements. Here, back at the house (from a baseball game) we see the empty room and hear the door buzzer as the camera pulls back. Taeko arrives home to find Setsuko there. "I'll never call my husband Mr. Fat-head" ...
• 0:35:36: And the camera pushes forward on Mokichi at his desk ...
• 0:36:00: More parallelism: The President wants to talk with Mokichi. The meeting is interrupted, but The President tells his father-in-law, who had come to visit, that he'll probably send Mokichi abroad soon. At 1:23:23 he tells him ...
• 0:40:14: Chishu Ryu is Sadao Hirayama, who runs the pachinko parlor ...
• 0:48:12: From Early Summer: Identical pillow shots leading into the Kabuki theatre scene. Identical pan down the aisle, except here we the camera stops on Taeko and a man we've not seen before (Setsuko's suitor) ...
• 1:08:05: Mokichi brings things to a head with Taeko: "If you force her (Setsuko) to marry, she'll end up like us." Taeko is a bitter and angry woman. Her transformation is staggering ...
• 1:28:20: Airplane taking off ...
• 1:35:33: From here on, Ozu does an amazing job with stillness of character. With no dialogue, Taeko sits at Mokichi's desk and begins to regret her behavior ... some gorgeous interior pillows ... and the clock strikes eleven bells. Mokichi is back (plane trouble).
• The rest of the film is both filled emotional resonance and just the right amount of humorous interplay. As they make the Ochazuke, we hear the clock strike twelve.
• 1:55:00: The film ends with Setsuko and Noboru playfully courting.
• This film was released the day after my birth.

Ozu4 by Lewis Saul

*41. Kaze no naka no mendori (A Hen in the Wind) (9/20/48) (90 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]

A destitute woman is awaiting the demobilization of her husband when her child falls ill. She prostitutes herself to pay the hospital. When her husband returns, she tells all. He knocks her down the stairs but later apologizes, suddenly realizing all she has been through.

• The DVD is all-region.
• Kinuyo Tanaka is excellent as the wife.
• Once again, we have the sick child and the wife freaking out because there is no money for the hospital bill. (Health care debate, anyone?)
• The melodrama reaches a boiling point. The screen time between his pushing her down the stairs and the end where all is forgiven and they embrace is just a few short minutes.
• However, if we contemplate the situation deeply, we might come to the conclusion that this man -- who probably committed, or at least witnessed, some pretty terrible atrocities himself in recent years -- has realized that his wife's transgression is petty in comparison -- even honorable!
• The print is in excellent shape.

*42. Banshun (Late Spring) (9/1949) (108 min.) [Sound B&W) [buy it here]

A young woman, somewhat past the usual marriage age, lives with her father in Kamakura. She is happy with him, and when she hears of one of his friends remarrying, she disapproves. The father, however, feels that he is keeping her from marriage. She refuses several offers. Then her aunt tells her that her father is thinking of remarrying. She is disturbed, but believing that this is what he wants, she agrees to get married herself. Father and daughter go on a final trip together to Kyoto. When they return, she is married. The father, who had no intention of remarrying, is left alone.

• This Criterion release is a 2-disc set, which includes an excellent booklet with two essays; audio commentary by Richard Peña, program director of New York's Film Society of Lincoln Center; and -- best of all -- Wim Wender's tribute to Ozu: Tokyo-Ga (1985).
• One of a half-dozen or so Ozu films universally considered a masterpiece.
• I cannot find any real information about how Ozu and Setsuko Hara actually met, but there can be no doubt that he saw her work prior to 1949 -- including her star turn (one of the very few "female" pics) for Kurosawa in 1946 in No Regrets for Our Youth.
• Just as we had a "Kihachi" trilogy, this film is the first of the "Noriko" trilogy.
• This is the only film not to use the burlap weave background behind the credits since A Story of Floating Weeds. Instead, we have what looks like an aerial view of dried, cracked mud...

Ozu begins the film with four extraordinarily beautiful pillow shots:

1. [11 sec] Sign in Japanese and English: "Kitakamakura Station." We hear the ticking of a telegraph and a bell sounds...
2. [6 sec] Railroad tracks, fence, trees and sky in background...
3. [6 sec] Unlit signal light framed between two poles; lush trees in background...
4. [7 sec] Roof of large house...

The leisurely music begins in Cut 2; birds chirping.

• Something so relaxing in this pacing.
• The camera is at one end of a hallway, facing five women in kimonos, seated in an L-shape. Another woman enters -- her back to the camera -- and kneels, bows to the other women, who return her bow with a deep unison group bow...
• Reverse angle and we get our first Ozu shot of the beautiful Setsuko Hara.
• She sits down next to her aunt, another Ozu newcomer, who will also become a "regular" in the final films: the amazing Haruko Sugimura. (Kurosawa gave her a wicked role in his 1965 masterpiece Red Beard, where she plays the abusive whorehouse madame.)
• They converse, another woman, Akiko (the gorgeous Kuniko Miyake) enters, same bowing, and then
• Ozu cuts to three more pillow shots: stone steps, flowers and the teahouse. Then back to the women. The pacing is magical...
• The tea ceremony is quite beautiful.

Ozu3 by Lewis Saul

Today:

*36. Hitori musuko (The Only Son) (9/15/36) (87 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]
*37. Shukujo wa nani o wasureta ka (What Did the Lady Forget?) (3/3/37) (73 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]
*38. Todake no kyodai (The Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family) (3/1/41) (105 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]
*39. Chichi ariki (There Was a Father) (4/1/42) (94 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]
*40. Nagaya shinshiroku (Record of a Tenement Gentleman) (5/20/47) (72 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]

~~~

34. Kagamijishi (6/29/36) (24 min.) [Sound/Silent B&W clip of 17:36 here]

Ozu's only documentary was commissioned by the Japan Cultural Association to promote indigenous culture abroad. Kagamijishi is a lion dance in kabuki, about a court dancer who becomes possessed by a lion mask, and transforms from coy young maid to a fierce being with flowing mane. Shot in two parts, the dancing scenes were filmed in June 1935 using synch sound by the Tsuchihashi system. The silent, second part, shot in May 1936, takes place in the dressing room and shows the celebrated leading man Onoe Kikugoro IV reciting a poem. At the preview, guests commented on the unnatural expressions of the dancer and the authorities decided to withdraw the film.

It is astonishing to watch the very first Ozu images combined with live sound! However, instead of family conversations, we have beautiful Japanese orchestral music and some really amazing dancing!

• An excellent use of eighteen minutes of your busy day... 

35. Daigaku yoitoko (College is a Nice Place) (3/19/36) (114 min.) (Silent B&W NEP]

Ozu called it "a dark film" making the title ironic. The graduates return home and begin a hopeless search for jobs.

*36. Hitori musuko (The Only Son) (9/15/36) (83 min.) [Sound B&W] [buy it here]

A woman whose husband is no help to her at all raises her only son by herself, working hard so that he can be graduated from a university in Tokyo. Later, she spends most of her savings to visit him. She finds him married and with a child, and he, in turn, spends most of his money entertaining her in the capital.

• Another excellent Criterion release; paired with There Was a Father (1942).
• First feature film with sound.
• No commentary; but excellent interviews with Tadao Sato, David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Ozu scholars.
• The song Old Black Joe is incorporated throughout the score and is used at the very end as a kind of ironic commentary on the story...
• The background behind the credits is similar to the burlap weave which he began using in A Story of Floating Weeds. He does use the traditional weave for the intertitles.
• Ozu immediately lets us know that heavy business is to follow with an initial intertitle (in his first talkie!):
  • "Life's tragedy begins with the bond between parent and child. -- Ryunosuke Akutagawa"
    • (Akutagawa wrote the short story that Kurosawa turned into Rashomon.)
• The son's name is Ryosuke.
• An intertitle gives us the place and the time: "Shinshu, Central Japan -- 1923."
• The film begins with a self-referential joke ~ in many of his silents Ozu would show two clocks with a two- or three-minute differential; here we hear nine gongs, as the women carrying boxes filled with silkworms walk by ... it is 9:00 A.M. Silence. Then another set of bells begins to chime; Ozu cuts it off after the sixth ring!

Ozu2 by Lewis Saul

Today:

*29. Dekigokoro (Passing Fancy) (9/17/33) (101 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*30. Haha wo kowazuya (A Mother Should Be Loved) (5/11/34) (93 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*31. Ukikusa monogatari (A Story of Floating Weeds) (11/23/34) (86 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]
*33. Tôkyô no yado (An Inn in Tokyo) (11/21/35) (82 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]

***

*29. Dekigokoro (Passing Fancy) (9/17/33) (101 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]

A subtle and beautiful film about a boy and his father who live together in a tenement, the father working, the boy going to school. The father is attracted to a younger woman, and though nothing comes of it, the boy is worried and disappointed. Offered a new job in a distant town, the father goes off only to leave when halfway there to return to his son.

• This boxed Eclipse set also includes "I Was Born, But..." and "Tokyo Chorus" ... The Sosin score is, like the other two, a perfect compliment to this silent film.
• The first in the so-called "Kihachi" series -- named for the main character, played by Takeshi Sakamoto, who appeared in 24 Ozu films between 1928 and 1948. Chishu Ryu appeared in 33 (acc. IMDb; Ryu himself claimed he was in every Ozu picture but two, for a total of 52). Ryu would eventually pick up where Sakamoto left off in the portrayal of the Ozu alter-ego character...
• Both Sakamoto, who was Iwasaki, the boss, and young Tomio Aoki, who played Keiji in I Was Born, But... give beautiful, naturalistic performances here.
• Ryu plays the naniwabushi "singer" in the opening music hall sequence.
• There are three main gags in the scene, which is notable for Ozu's quick introduction of characters and the swiftly panning camera:
  • 1) Kihachi finds an empty coin purse and it gets passed around;
  • 2) Everyone gets attacked by biting fleas; and
  • 3) The way the barber applauds...
• A lovely transition: Tomio is helping his hungover father get dressed. His pants are torn and he smooths out the rip with his hand -- cut -- CU: Otome (Chôko Iida) is sewing the pants; cut to a medium shot where we see Tomio eating in the background...
• In a variation on a typical Ozu theme, the father plays hookey while the responsible son goes to school...
• The scene where Tomio unleashes his furious rage at his father is one of the most powerful moments in all of Ozu's films...
• Of course, no good deed goes unpunished. After making up with his son and giving him 50 sen spending money (a huge sum ~ remember the rice curry in Tokyo Chorus @ seven sen per plate?), the kid gets sick from eating too much (orange pop, jelly, cookies, fried cake, toffee, watermelon, and of course the cold sake Kihachi force-fed him).
• In the scenes leading up to Kihachi's departure, Ozu punctuates transitions with shots of exploding fireworks...
• The final scene recalls a shared father-son joke and ends on a fermata of swaying trees...

*30. Haha wo kowazuya (A Mother Should Be Loved) (5/11/34) (73 min.) [Silent B&W] [buy it here]

A family film about the relations between two half-brothers who have different mothers; good character delineation, somewhat spoiled by melodrama.

• The DVD requires a region-free player.