Thursday, December 27, 2007

Ozu's End of Summer: It's Just a Family Affair


"The Kohayagawa family is complicated indeed" says the company manager of this roguish family of independent saki brewers. The patriarch of this is a aging hedonistic rounder with his daughter and a love of his life from decades past. The uncle is trying to arrange a marriage for his widowed sister with the finesse of a part-time bumbling pimp. And high strung seems to mild to describe another of the senior Kohayagawa's daughters especially when her philandering father is concerned.

This film described above seems closer to Robert Altman or Wes Anderson territory than the cinema of Yasujiro Ozu. "End of Summer" is his next to last film. It is filled with characters reassuring themselves they have or should have no regrets. And the last act is a meditation on mortality ending with a funeral procession over a footbridge and crows gathering. It feels like a closing work of an artist near the end, similar to tone of Ingmar Bergman's last film Sarraband.

Ozu uses establishing shots before major dialog sequences as he did in his other films, but a couple of the images show here weigh out more editorially. He shows a contrast of modern Japan, a temple and an office building in the same shot or another with a temple and a building with a TV antenna in the shot. And the Kohayagwawa's daughter from the "secret" family is a crass, materialistic shrew in pursuit of American men and a mink stoll.

This film is much more than a trifle. You can't help but be charmed by Ganjiro Nakamura's as the fun loving patriarch. His zest and love of life are fun to watch as is its response to the rest of the family. He keeps the pace up high, even as the family shakes their heads and uptight daughter openly wishes out loud that he would act his age. Towards his end he bets on bicycle races, tears up the ticket, and is ready for the next joy. I'm believing this is the message Ozu wants to leave us with here with last words from the character, not waxing profound, but asking "Is this it, is this really it?
posted by well-executed buffet at 11:51 AM
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