It’s minor Ozu, but only in the context of the great run he was on at the time- I had a hard time finding the most beautiful screenshots here (this isn’t as well-known as his other work from the period) but there are plenty of gorgeous shots and interiors- enough to make it a top 10 of 1952 for me upon first viewing
Smaller role for Ryu- Ozu’s actor—but there’s a great scene where he sings an old battle him
Unlike Mizoguchi or Kurosawa, Ozu was always obstinately modern—English influences (to the characters, not Ozu)- baseball
I love and adore his transition corridors– empty
Stools at the bar in a row—
There were 12 tracking shots here- including the ending where we, correctly, end on the young couple just starting out on their bitter sweet marriage (bitter sweet is always Ozu’s dual theme)—several of the earlier tracking shots are reverse and then he settles on a gorgeous interior. It’s really well done
Love the shot of the two half open shoji doors and the 4 women sitting at various depths of field
A story of an unhappy marriage- it gets pretty ugly Michiyo Kogure’s “Taeko” is a lot to handle. The husband, Shin Saburi, is basically just drifting
He’s a mentor here but if you were going to do a homosexual reading of Ozu (no idea if he was actually gay) there’s a reading here of the Saburi character and the young mentee Koji Tsuruta
Great shop and restaurant sign work here with Ozu’s “noodle” shop sign as a pillow shot
I love the furniture layering in the frame by Ozu as he build’s his mise-en-scene
I found myself pretty swept up in the narrative/marriage
The climax scene is an understated (of course) reunion between man and wife. I love the scene as they move around each other in the kitchen making the dish here in the title- we have the kitchen island, the stool, the oil bottle, two sake bottles and the two characters all carefully placed in the mise-en scene
The water tower pillow shot- laundry and luggage for his trip to Bolivia in the hall
How did the man come up with these titles?