Tokyo monogatari
by
MOVIE CATEGORY
Even today, Ozu’s most famous film – which celebrates its seventieth anniversary this year – is visualy extremely refined. It is a chronicle tinged with bitterness of the journey of an elderly couple who, for the first time, visit their married children in the metropolis. Despite all the expressions of affection, the children have neither the time nor the inclination to take care of the elderly couple; only the daughter-in-law, the wife of a third son lost in the war, will truly be close to them.
As Donald Richie wrote, at this point in his career «Ozu’s style, now completely refined, utterly economical, creates a film that is unforgettable because it is so right, so true, and also because it demands so much from its audience. Evasions of any sort are rare in an Ozu picture, but here there are none at all. Two generations, a simple story that allows all the characters to change places, a pervading delineation of high summer, and the deceptive simplicity of the film’s style – all these combine to create a picture so Japanese and at the same time so personal, and hence so universal in its appeal, that it becomes a masterpiece». Wim Wenders particularly celebrated this work in his film Tokyo-Ga.
DIRECTORY
Born in Tokyo in 1903 and considered with Mizoguchi Kenji and Kurosawa Akira to be one of the most important directors of Japanese cinema, Yasujirō Ozu marked its major milestones with his work, from the silent era to the color years, reaching the threshold of modernity. His significant influence on contemporary cinema has been acknowledged by filmmakers such as Wim Wenders and Hou Hsiao-hsien, who paid homage to his work. Gradually, Ozu’s cinema revolved around a single and overarching theme, that of the family, with particular emphasis on the relationship between parents and children. Straying from a sociological approach, the director focused primarily on maternal, paternal, and filial sentiments as the main subjects of his films, managing to imbue them with a universal quality, free from any particularism. This is why, even though his stories are rooted in the customs and traditions of his country (in his homeland, he is still regarded as “the most Japanese of Japanese directors”), his films truly manage to resonate with everyone, engaging viewers from the most diverse cultures.
