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Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963)
Biography
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Yasujiro Ozu was born in the Fukugawa district of Tokyo, December 12, 1903. He was active in Japanese film during the late 20s as Japan began to adopt an approach similar to Hollywood's studio system. His first film as director was Sword of Penitence (1927). He went on to direct 53 films in all - most of which deal with contemporary Japanese life. His first major film is generally considered to be the 1932 comedy Umarete wa mita keredo (I was born, but...). He made his first talkie, Hitori musuko (The Only Son), in 1936 and his first film in colour, Higambana (Equinox Flower), in 1958, using a newly developed Japanese color-film process. After Umarete wa mita keredo, Ozu's vision grew darker, while whatever social consciousness he possessed grew fainter. In his films the family itself became an enclosed, self-sufficient unit, but one that suffered from outside interference. In many of his films from the late 1930s, a single parent (the other having died or run off) tries to cope with raising one or two children and finding them spouses in order to continue the family line. Work and the difficulties of making a living intrude on home life. There is usually a great deal of affection between parent and child that is threatened by their opposed wills. A child may wish to remain unmarried and resists parental attempts at matchmaking. Occasionally, a child feels threatened when a parent wishes to remarry. In short, the friction between parent and child arises over what course life should take outside the secure comfort of home. The greatest fear is of separation, which the parent accepts with stoic resolve as inevitable and necessary.
After World War II, Ozu took a stern view of the corrupting influence of postwar society on the institution of the family. In his most famous film, Tokyo monogatari (1953, Tokyo Story) an elderly couple from a small town travel to Tokyo to visit their married children. Shunted from one to the other, they are treated kindly only by the widow of their dead son. Their children are too caught up in the frenzy of modern life to pay them any attention. Soon after their return home, the mother dies, leaving the father alone. Ozu listed this film as one of his personal favorites, along with Chichi ariki and Banshun (1949, Late Spring).
Tokyo monogatari expresses another common element in Ozu's cinema: several peripheral characters are negligent relatives who do not meet their obligations to the family. Though they are not evil, they are uncaring, unfeeling, and unresponsive to anything but their own desires.
In his last films, Ozu's outlook was one of gentle resignation to the ways of the world. His characters still face the same problems - marriage, unruly children, retirement, loneliness - but they bear their disappointments with wistful good humor. Even his most somber films have moments of humor that recall his early training in comedy and youthful mischievousness. His last six films, though his most conservative both socially and stylistically, are the most light-hearted since his very early work. They are full of wry jokes and playful banter. Ozu had an earthy sense of humor attuned to the silly rituals and fantasies of little boys and old men, between which he found strong parallels. He was also fond of jokes based on reverse syllogisms, such as one uttered by a character who has not seen his son in years: "He's so tall. No wonder we're so old."
Over the course of producing and directing 53 films, Ozu gradually refined a singular technique that has come to be regarded as the essence of the Japanese cinema aesthetic, even if it is rather Ozuïs very personal way of looking of things. lt is characterized by low camera placement, approximating the angle of vision one would have sitting on woven tatami mats in a traditional Japanese room; static compositions that proceed in leisurely and well-ordered transitions punctuated only by simple cuts; and laconic dialogue with the plain ring of everyday conversation. Many shots of the principal characters and locales are repeated frequently through the course of a picture, creating the cozy familiarity of old friends and comfortable places. This feeling is enhanced for those who have seen several of Ozu's films, for he used the same actors to play virtually the same parts in what were only subtle variations on his single theme, and many of which have similar titles. Yet each of his films, created from the smallest means, has its own distinct character and emotional power. All are characterized by an elegant simplicity. Although his films are rooted in the particular experience of Japanese life, Ozu's international appeal can be explained by this simplicity. They touch upon the universal desire for a secure and happy home life and familial affection. [Adapted from Teach & Text]
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