Everything about Yasujir Ozu totally explained
was an influential
Japanese film director. Although marriage and family were among the most persistent themes in his body of work, Ozu ironically remained single and childless all of his life.
Early life
Ozu was born in the
Fukagawa district of
Tokyo. At the age of 10, he and his siblings were sent by his mother to live at his father's home town of
Matsuzaka,
Mie Prefecture, where he spent most of his youth. He was educated at a boarding school, but spent much of his time in the local cinema instead of the classroom. He worked briefly as a teacher before returning to Tokyo in 1923 to join the
Shochiku Film Company.
Early career
Ozu was initially hired as an assistant
cameraman. He became an
assistant director within three years, and directed his first film,
Zange no Yaiba ("The Sword of Penitence", now lost), in 1927. He went on to make a further 53 films: 26 in his first five years as a director, and all but 3 for Shochiku studios.
Ozu first made a number of short comedies, before turning to more serious themes in the 1930s. His
Umarete wa mita keredo ("I Was Born, But…", 1932), a comedy with serious overtones on adolescence, not only marks the beginning of this transition, but was also received by movie critics as the first notable work of
social criticism in Japanese cinema, winning Ozu wide acclaim.
In 1935, Ozu made a short documentary with soundtrack:
Kagami Shishi, in which Kokiguro VI performed
Kabuki dance of the same title. This was made as per a request by Ministry of Education.
Like the rest of Japan's cinema industry, Ozu was slow to switch to the production of
talkies: his first film with a dialogue soundtrack was
Hitori Musuko ("The Only Son") in 1936, five years after Japan's first talking film, Heinosuke Gosho's "The Neighbor's Wife and Mine".
World War II
In July 1937, at a time when Shochiku was unhappy about Ozu's lack of box-office success (despite the praise and awards he received from critics), the 34-year-old Ozu was conscripted into the
Imperial Japanese Army, and he served for two years in
China as an
infantry corporal in the
Second Sino-Japanese War.
The first film Ozu made on his return was the critically and commercially successful
Toda-ke no Kyodai ("
Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family", 1941). He followed this with an
autobiographical theme:
Chichi Ariki ("There Was a Father", 1942), describing the strong bonds of affection between a father and son despite years of separation.
In 1943, Ozu was again drafted into the army to make a
propaganda film in
Burma. However, he was sent to
Singapore instead, where he spent much of his time watching
American films that the Japanese army had confiscated. According to
Donald Richie, Ozu's favorite was
Orson Welles'
Citizen Kane.
Postwar career
Ozu's films were most favorably received from the late 1940s, with works such as
Banshun ("
Late Spring", 1949),
Tokyo Monogatari ("
Tokyo Story", 1953) – considered to be his masterpiece –
Ochazuke no Aji ("
The Flavour of Green Tea Over Rice", 1952),
Soshun ("
Early Spring", 1956),
Higanbana ("
Equinox Flower", 1958, his first film in colour),
Ukikusa ("
Floating Weeds", 1959) and
Akibiyori ("
Late Autumn", 1960).
Ozu often worked with screenwriter
Kogo Noda; other regular collaborators included cameraman Yuharu Atsuta and the actors
Chishu Ryu,
Setsuko Hara and
Haruko Sugimura.
As a director, Ozu was eccentric and a notorious perfectionist. His films were typically infused with the Japanese concept of
Mono no aware, an awareness of the impermanence of things. He was seen as one of the 'most Japanese' film-makers, and as such his work was only rarely shown overseas before the 1960s.
Ozu's last film was
Sanma no aji ("
An Autumn Afternoon") in 1962. He died the following year of
cancer on his 60th birthday, and his grave is at the temple of
Engaku-ji,
Kamakura.
Ozu was also well-known for his drinking and, excepting
Sam Peckinpah, was probably the heaviest drinker of all major film directors. In fact, Ozu and his co-screenwriter Kogo Noda used to measure the progress of their scripts by how many bottles of
sake they'd drunk. (Occasionally, visitors to his grave pay their respects by leaving cans and bottles of alcoholic drink.)
Legacy
Ozu is possibly as well-known (if not more) for the technical style and innovation of his films as for the narrative content. The style of his films is most distinctive in his later films, and he hadn't fully developed it until his post-war
talkies. He didn't conform to most
Hollywood conventions, most notably the
180 degree rule. Also, rather than use the typical over-the-shoulder shots in his dialogue scenes, the camera gazes on the actors directly, which has the effect of placing the viewer in the middle of the scene. Ozu also didn't use typical transitions between scenes. In between scenes he'd show shots of certain static objects as transitions, or use direct cuts, rather than fades or dissolves. He moved the camera less and less as his career progressed, and ceased using tracking shots altogether in his color films. He also invented the "tatami shot," in which the camera is placed at a low height, precisely where it would be if one were kneeling on a
tatami mat.
In narrative structure, Ozu was also an innovator in his use of ellipses, in which many major events are left out, leaving only the space between them. For example, in "
An Autumn Afternoon" a wedding is mentioned in one scene, and then in the next, a reference is made to the wedding that already occurred. The wedding, however, never occurs on screen. This is typical of Ozu's films.
The films "
Late Spring", "
Tokyo Story", "
Good Morning" and "
Early Summer" all feature young brothers named Minoru and Isamu.
Partial filmography
The following 33 films survive:
- Days of Youth (1929, 学生ロマンス 若き日)
- Walk Cheerfully (1930, 朗かに歩め)
- I Flunked But... (1930, 落第はしたけれど)
- That Night's Wife (1930, その夜の妻)
- The Lady and The Beard (1931)
- Tokyo Chorus (1931, 東京の合唱)
- I Was Born, But... (1932, 大人の見る繪本 生れてはみたけれど)
- Where Now Are The Dreams Of Youth (1932, 靑春の夢いまいづこ)
- Woman of Tokyo (1933, 東京の女)
- Dragnet Girl (1933, 非常線の女)
- Passing Fancy (1933)
- A Mother Should be Loved (1934) (no complete prints known to exist)
- A Story of Floating Weeds (1934, 浮草物語)
- An Inn in Tokyo (1935, 東京の宿)
- The Only Son (1936, ひとり息子)
- What Did the Lady Forget? (1937, 淑女は何を忘れたか)
- Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family (1941, 戸田家の兄妹)
- There Was a Father (1942, 父ありき)
- Record of a Tenement Gentleman (1947, 長屋紳士録)
- A Hen in the Wind (1948, 風の中の牝鶏)
- Late Spring (1949, 晩春)
- The Munakata Sisters (1950, 宗方姉妹)
- Early Summer (1951, 麥秋)
- Tea Over Rice (1952, お茶漬けの味)
- Tokyo Story (1953, 東京物語)
- Early Spring (1956, 早春)
- Tokyo Twilight (1957, 東京暮色)
- Equinox Flower (1958, 彼岸花)
- Good Morning (1959, お早よう)
- Floating Weeds (1959, 浮草)
- Late Autumn (1960), 秋日和)
- The End of Summer (1961, 小早川家の秋)
- An Autumn Afternoon (1962, 秋刀魚の味)
Tributes
In the movie Tokyo-Ga, director Wim Wenders travels to Japan to explore the world of Ozu, interviewing both Chishu Ryu and Yuharu Atsuta.
In 2003, the centenary of Ozu's birth was commemorated at various film festivals around the world. Shochiku produced the film Café Lumière (珈琲時光), directed by Taiwanese filmmaker Hou Hsiao-Hsien as homage to Ozu, with direct reference to the late master's Tokyo Story (1953), to premiere on Ozu's birthday.
John Walker, editor of the Halliwell`s Film Guides, placed Tokyo Story top in a list of the best 1000 films yet made.
The 2003 movie Five Dedicated to Ozu, by Iranian filmaker Abbas Kiarostami, is a tribute to Ozu. The film consists of five long shots, averaging about 16 minutes each.Further Information
Get more info on 'Yasujir Ozu'.
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