Koto English-speaking Volunteer Guide Association: 2015-12

Are you old enough to remember the term ''silver screen''? Yes, or no? I say YES.

The silver screen originated a kind of silver-coated projection screen that was popular in the early years of the film industry.

Setsuko Hara (1920-2015), one of the female stars of the silver screen, passed away in September at the age of 95. A Japanese film director and screenwriter Yasujiro Ozu highly appreciated Hara's talent and often casted her in the leading role in his films.

Searching for Yasujiro Ozu

Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963) is often called the most "Japanese" of Japanese film directors. He created films about typical middle-class Japanese lives and family relationships. He made 54 films in his life.

I am a film lover and I saw several Ozu's films, but to be honest. they didn't leave me much impression. What is more, as far as Setsuko Hara, Akira Kurosawa's "The Idiot" in which she played a wicked woman being completely different character from that in Ozu's films was much more impressive for me.

However, things could be different this time, because I tried to follow Ozu's footsteps here in his hometown Fukagawa, and search for reasons why he was referred to as the most Japanese of Japanese film directors and also as one of the world's greatest directors. Anyway, when I finish writing this blog, I'll be definitely picking out Ozu's works in my DVD library.

Memorial tablet for his birthplace (1-chome, Fukagawa)

Born and raised in Fukagawa

Yasujiro Ozu was born in the old Fukagawa district (present Koto City) of Tokyo, in 1903, as the second son of Toranosuke, a manager at the top fertilizer wholesaler Yuasa-ya. Yasujiro attended Meiji elementary school. When he was at the age of ten, Ozu family moved to his father's hometown Matsusaka in Mie Prefecture. In August 1923 young

Yasujiro came back to Tokyo and joined the Kamata Studio of Shochiku Film Company. Shortly thereafter, in September 1923, the Great Kanto Earthquake occurred and the Fukagawa area suffered catastrophic damage. On that day he walked back to Fukagawa from the Kamata Studio and the following morning he was reunited with his all family members survived the disaster.

A guardian dog donated by Fukagawa fertilizer wholesalers including Yuasa-ya

(Tomioka Hachimangu Shrine)

Pursuing a career in filmmaking

In 1927, Ozu became a director at Shochiku, making his first silent film Zange no yaiba or "Sword of Penitence." He was very interested in Hollywood movies and their influences could be glimpsed in his early films

One of Ozu's first masterpieces and also the last greatest Japanese silent films is the comedy & drama Umarete wa mita keredo or "I Was Born But …" in 1932. It gained critical and financial success and was voted the best Japanese film of the year in the "Kinema Jumpo"* poll. In this film Ozu adopted the technique, which would become his style and trademark such as low angle, minimal or static camera work and simple cuts, etc.

*Japan's oldest and premiere cinema magazine.

Posters of Ozu's films (Koto City Furuishiba Culture Center: KCFCC)

Stories set in Koto City

Ozu made five films being set in Koto City:

- Dekigokoro "Passing Fancy" (1933),

- Tokyo no yado "An Inn in Tokyo" (1935)

- Hitori musuko "The Only Son" (1936)

- Kaze no naka no mendori "A Hen in the Wind" (1948)

- Tokyo monogatari "Tokyo Story" (1953)

- Akibiyori "Late Autumn" (1960)

Emerging as a world film director

Ozu made 54 films (37 of them extant). Sanma no aji or "An Autumn Afternoon" (1962) was his last film. Ozu never married or had his own children, living with his mother until her death in 1962. As though he was following his mother, he died of cervical malignancy in 1963, almost on his 60th birthday. Shortly before his death, Ozu's films appeared in foreign movie theaters and International film festivals.

In 2012, "Tokyo Story" topped in the British Film Institute poll of Greatest Films of Directors and Critics published in "Sight & Sound"*, receiving 48 votes out of the 358 directors polled.

*British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute (BFI), since 1932

Once in an interview he said, "As my principle of life, I follow the general fashion in ordinary matters and moral laws in serious matters, but in matters of art I follow myself."