Yasujiro Ozu made one of my favorite films of all time - the magnificently emotional and sad Tokyo Story - so I was very grateful to receive two Ozu box-sets for a recentish birthday. I'm just sorry it has taken me so long to get round to seeing them. This is the first in my Ozu catch up.
This 1947 effort is one of Ozu's first films. With a running time of a measly 71 minutes, the film focuses on Kohei, a young boy abandoned by his father who has gone off to Tokyo to look for work. Kohei follows a poor tenement dweller home and the tenement then bicker and argue over who is to look after the boy. Then, of course, the inevitable soul-searching is done and lessons are learnt, albeit rather hastily, given the running time.
The main problem with this film is indeed its running time. It is incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to achieve the kind of emotional punch in the face Ozu is going for here in an hour and ten minutes. You are left feeling that you simply don't know the characters well enough, don't quite fully understand where they are coming from, and the eventual emotional turnaround, therefore, feels far too quick and out of shape. It's a lovely idea and what there is of it is, for the most part, done very well. It's simply that there is not enough of it. A real shame. This feels like a three hour film squeezed into 60 (or so) minutes.
The performances are generally excellent. Shoko Lida is exceptional as the harsh, brutal, unmarried Tane who ends up being tricked into taking the boy in. It's an excellent performance and it is mainly down to her that the film, and its turnaround, works at all. Hohi Aoki is full of emotion and sadness as the young, abandoned, boy. It's fortunate, though, that it is mostly a silent part (he's got the expression and the emotion down pat) because he's awful whenever he has to open his mouth, especially when it's to cry. Also nice to see a fleeting and measured appearance by MyFilmVault lister Chishu Ryu.
This is worth a go. It's only 71 minutes of your life after all. The cinematography is noteworthy and full credit must go to Yuuharu Atsuta for the way a desolate, broken and sad post WW2 Japan is landscaped. The music is sweet, enchanting, and adds another, much needed, layer to this thin effort. And, of course, there is Ozu himself. No one does abandonment, isolation, loneliness and sadness like Ozu. And with this being filmed in 1947, there is again another layer of meaning in here. Like so much of the best Japanese cinema of this era, the film carries a strong socialist message (naturally reflective of a communalistic culture like Japan's) about duty, helping others and about right and wrong. It's just a shame that, like so much else about this film, there is simply not enough of it to fully drive home the point. Like ships passing in the night, this is a silhouette of something strange and beautiful but one you know you are never destined to know on a deeper, more soulful, level.
B-
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