Ozu

I never got around to following up on this post, which was touted as the first in a series. I’ve been thinking lately about how to explain to people why Ozu is so great. Peter Bradshaw, a better writer than I, does a nice job in this essay:

Ozu’s mannerisms of directing are very eccentric if you are not used to them. He uses low shooting positions, as if the camera itself is bowing, group compositions in profile and restful tableaux of outdoor landscapes (often showing railway lines or stations) or empty interiors to cleanse the viewer’s palate between scenes. He does not fade or dissolve between scenes, but crisply cuts. Oddly, his characters will often speak straight into the camera for dialogue exchanges – something that would get today’s film-school students hit across the knuckles with a ruler. It is a style so formally distinctive and stylised as virtually to constitute a kabuki-cinema language of Ozu’s own invention. Nobody else in Japanese cinema worked like this. But soon one becomes used to it – and then completely hooked.

Quite so. While many of his early films are very good, it’s when he settles into the rythym of his mature period (which I would date from the 1949 masterpiece Late Spring through his final work, 1962’s Autumn Afternoon) is entirely unique, profoundly accomplished, and thoroughly intoxicating. That only five of his films are available on North American DVD is a travesty. (Hopefully, more are coming. Several of the live scores preformed at the film forum were recorded for potential use on future DVDs.)

This post has a point: any Seattle-area readers who missed the Ozu program this Winter have a chance to partially redeem themselves; they are bringing back, for one night only, the 1934 silent “Women of Tokyo” (with a live score performed by Wayne Horvitz) Sunday, October 2nd, at 8:00 PM. I haven’t seen this particular film, but I feel quite confident in my recommendation. See you there.