1933, silent, black and white. Directed by Ozu Yasujiro. Starring Okada Yoshiko, Egawa Ureo, and Tanaka Kinuyo. Subtitles in English, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Polish, Italian, French and Spanish. 1933年。小津安二郎監督。無音映画。
Does he kinda look like Buster Keaton? The fact that there's no sound, helps the affect. Don't read the next post unless you want to know what happens at the end of the movie.
Suggested soundtrack selections that can be found on RU-vid, to accompany this silent film: >> Hiroshi Yoshimura (吉村弘) - Wet Land (1993) [Full Album] (30 minutes) >> followed by the beginning portion of Brian Eno's "Thursday Afternoon" (60 minutes total length). These two ambient works smoothly match the pacing of this Ozu masterpiece. ...
15,40 -1 celular-- el cine silente nipon mas natural que el gringo--peculiar secador de calcetines y como lo hace con el aditamento que se ve al fondo-- sapiencia asiatica--
What a great film. Completely silent and you hardly notice. You can really see how good the editing is. (This is a trick if you want to actually see how a film is: turn off the sound!) The lighting and performances are top rate. The film just appears so natural-showing Ozo’s mastery of “Hollywood style” filmmaking. I’m always surprised by how good Ozo is.
A lot of Japanese people in 21st century cannot understand why Ryo had to commit suicide. Today`s Japanese are very different from 1933 when this movie was made.
In my research in Japan, the people born in the post-war period, meaning after 1964, do not have the old way of Japanese. Perhaps this is best because the old way of thinking led to a disastrous war.
I guess these inevitable steps of Japan towards modernity and the ability or willingness of individuals to take them but still conserving kindness and emotion are a main theme of Ozu. Especially impressive to see it here, in a film from 1933, when the the Second World War hadn't taken place yet and one could argue (although I'm by no means an expert on the topic) that modern themes of sexual liberation as well as American cultural influence wasn't as strong. Still it is Ozu's focus. Maybe there's a hint there that even without overt Americanization and aftermath of the war, emancipation was sensible in Japan of the 30s and would have been on the rise regardless.
