Review of Late Spring (1949) by Aaron A — 31 May 2012

Synopsis: In post-World War II Japan, grieving widower Shukichi Somiya, takes comfort in the presence of his only daughter, who's old enough to marry but chooses instead to stay home and care for her aging father.

I was having a conversation the other day with a good friend of mine. My friend is fairly into films, though he is often busy with school and doesn't watch the amount of films he would like. And so he says to me, "I have to write an essay on a Japanese film for my Japanese language course, think you could recommend to me some good non-samurai themed Japanese films?", at which I realized that my experience with foreign language cinema, and more precisely Japanese cinema, isn't where I what I prefer. So I suggested one of the few non-samurai japanese flicks I had seen, "Ugetsu", and vowed to make a conscious effort to watch more foreign language cinema.

And it's seems to have been a great decision as I finished watching one of Yasujiro Ozu's most renown works, Late Spring. The film has the same temperament as it's title suggests, the picture is warm, and has that calm but not lazy feeling one usually can find in Springtime. Though it's my first encounter with Mr. Ozu's work, it's clear that the man had a voice of his own. His screen compositions, the way he frames his characters in relation to their environment, is both unique and absolutely beautiful, and have the wonderful effect of placing the characters in an environment, instead of building an environment around the actors; and probably goes a long way in keeping this film from aging.

But the picture has many more human qualities that make it such a pleasant watch. First starters the acting is exceptional. Though starting off they aren't immediately impressive, by the end of the picture these actors will have your emotions wrapped around their every nuance. Nut perhaps what makes this film the masterpiece it is, is the universality of the film's script. A melancholy examination of change.

Perfectly scripted, directed with auteur style, and containing two wonderful performances from it's leads, Late Spring is a jovial achievement.