BFI: 32 Ozu Films

[Jack Phillips]

Yasujiro Ozu and the art of Benshi.

Way cool! Clive Bell? Isn't he the bloke on all those Jah Wobble albums?

[mostly asia]

no news about the next Ozu's?.... :/

[MichaelB]

The second I hear anything, it'll be posted here.

[mostly asia]

ok

[Michael Kerpan]

The second I hear anything, it'll be posted here.

Is it my imagination -- or do people only seem _really_ interested in the releases from this Ozu series while waiting for _next_ releases? (I'm feeling rather let down down by the lack of discussion of the 3 films included in the last set). ;~{

[Matt]

I'm feeling rather let down down by the lack of discussion of the 3 films included in the last set

I'm waiting for a sale or a price drop on the gangsters set (though I haven't really been that talkative about the previous releases). Ozu is kind of a private pleasure for me. I wouldn't want to have to get into defending or explaining why I love his work.

[AlexHansen]

It'd be hard for me to defend/explain as well, though I'll include my notes from my Hulu viewing of Walk Cheerfully a while back, perhaps they'll kick start a little something. Ozu's a world I need to dwell in repeatedly before I'd be comfortable trying to put things into (more fleshed out) words. The same goes for something like Straub/Huillet. Something about the purity & complex simplicity of their work makes it hard to grapple with adequately.

Notes on WC: Chalk arrows, ominous guidance, being led somewhere. Discarded broken doll, talk about a loaded image. Toe tapping. Polishing the golf club. Walking like there’s gum on their shoes.

[zedz]

The second I hear anything, it'll be posted here.

Is it my imagination -- or do people only seem _really_ interested in the releases from this Ozu series while waiting for _next_ releases? (I'm feeling rather let down down by the lack of discussion of the 3 films included in the last set). ;~{

I think this is a recurring problem all over this forum: people getting far more excited by announcements than by releases. Just look at the dozens and dozens of 'hotly anticipated' Criterion releases which attract practically no comment when they're actually released (but might nevertheless have led to page after page after page of cover art bitching).

[knives]

I think part of the problem there is in regards to excitement. It's easier to get excited enough to do a proper writeup for a new experience, but if it is just a new release of an old favorite the excitement to write up directly in relation to the film is ever so slightly harder. At least that's what I assume the situation is since my lack of writing up 90% of the time is because I'm terrible at it and don't wish to make anyone suffer.

[artfilmfan]

(I'm feeling rather let down down by the lack of discussion of the 3 films included in the last set). ;~{

The lack of discussions is probably due to the lack of drinks. Ref: your February 18th posting.

[Oedipax]

As lame as it sounds, and as reasonable from a technical standpoint the decision may have been, I got much less excited about these Ozu releases once they switched to DVD from bluray. But I do plan on getting and viewing them all, eventually.

[longstone]

I'd just like to say that I really appreciate these releases. Prior to the Student comedies set and the Gangster set being released I had not seen any of those films. So to now own seven complete silents, two surviving segments plus Woman of Tokyo from the melodramas set that I had not previously had the chance to enjoy is fantastic. I hope the BFI do complete the set and that the previous titles are selling well enough to justify continuing.
I enjoyed the booklets too.

[Jonathan S]

The second I hear anything, it'll be posted here.

Is it my imagination -- or do people only seem _really_ interested in the releases from this Ozu series while waiting for _next_ releases? (I'm feeling rather let down down by the lack of discussion of the 3 films included in the last set). ;~{

I think this is a recurring problem all over this forum: people getting far more excited by announcements than by releases. Just look at the dozens and dozens of 'hotly anticipated' Criterion releases which attract practically no comment when they're actually released (but might nevertheless have led to page after page after page of cover art bitching).

This mindset is typical of collectors (of anything), and without it there would probably be no home video or recording industry. Irving Berlin said it best.

[John Edmond]

This is all true, and I'm as guilty of this as any, but it's also to do with anticipation. Music forums are equally plagued by this. In part it's as much to do with what's easy or novel to talk about. I love the series but that is banal, when I have something new to say about Ozu, I promise I'll pipe up.

[repeat]

Godard said it well too - can't find the quote now, but the gist was that he didn't believe in home video because it would only end up with people spending more time buying films than actually watching them. (Peter von Bagh has also often lamented this "once you own it, you don't have to watch it" attitude that the DVD market seems to cultivate)

I too have a bunch of those BFI Ozu's still in shrinkwrap since last year (I've seen most of the films though) - constantly intending to rewatch them, but there's this silly compulsion to try and cut down the kevyip by watching something new, even though I know that there's no chance of it being any better than any of these...

[Jonathan S]

(Peter von Bagh has also often lamented this "once you own it, you don't have to watch it" attitude that the DVD market seems to cultivate)

Over 30 years ago, there was a similar joke that a VCR was a device that enabled you not to miss TV programmes without actually having to watch them!

[tenia]

it would only end up with people spending more time buying films than actually watching them.

I'm not sure that's actually the problem, but more buying more stuff than you have time to watch it, no ?

[swo17]

At least we're able to have a healthy discussion about why we're not having a healthy discussion about films.

[Michael Kerpan]

Well, I hope to see more discussion of these films in the future -- as they are (to me, at least) often visually surprising AND lots of fun to watch. ;~}

[zedz]

Next in line at the confessional:

I haven't watched the Gangsters set yet, but I'll only be watching the one film I haven't seen yet (Walk Cheerfully) when I do, since I'm planning on doing an Alpha-Omega Ozu re-watchthrough when the BFI completes their series.

But I have read the booklet: great work, Michael, a really informed and informative essay.

[liam fennell]

Well, I bought the set. I still don't have the student comedies but the Eclipse Ozu and Naruse silent boxes are some of my most viewed films and I've long wanted to see Dragnet Girl because of the oft-mentioned Sternberg influence. I'm saving the middle film for a rainy day but both Walk Cheerfully and Dragnet Girl were excellent. The bit from Tokkan Kozo was also wonderful - I love that kid!

The earlier film is sort of slap-dash but in a charming and energetic way. He is having fun with the milieu. When Ozu does the rare dolly shot it is always perfect, which is to say both cinematic and informative story-wise. I of course love the clean lines of the later Ozu pictures but kind of wish he had never abandoned his dolly tracks! The choreographed dancing gangsters also never failed to make me smile and even that quirk serves to further the story - it is like a secret handshake or signal (it kind of reminded me of that Buster Keaton short The High Sign!)

Dragnet Girl was a much more mature work, on par with the other later silent masterpieces. I felt it dragged towards the end with the endless deliberating of the main gangster guy, perhaps, but it didn't bother me much because the whole film was such a rich tapestry. Every shot here was perfectly balanced and realized, the picture was a real treat to finally see! Ozu, it seems to me, was by this point clearly carefully thinking about how he would like to eventually use sound; many scenes in the record store were so deftly handled I felt like I could hear the music the character was listening to. The main influence seemed more Scarface than Underworld, but all the shadowy lighting was a nice change either way.

One thing I notice more and more watching these very late silents from Ozu and Naruse is how they use the intertitles to transition between scenes. They do an approximation of the sound editing technique where the first scene is overlaid by sound/dialogue from the following scene before the cut or fade into the following scene proper... I'm not sure how to best describe it (there must be a technical term for this?)

Ozu and Naruse will both often show an intertitle and you might not find out who said the dialogue until two or three shots later. This kind of transitioning is very effective with sound but I find it even more effective in a silent! Without sound cues I find myself a little bewildered and end up analyzing the visual information they are presenting more thoroughly.

I know I've seen this now-basic technique here and there in older sound films but I've never seen it in other silent films or if so it wasn't so strategically deployed as by both Ozu and Naruse. Is this something other Japanese directors did in the silent era or were these two idiosyncratic Shochiku directors just comparing notes as I like to imagine? I haven't read Bordwell's book yet - does he discuss this little trick?

[Michael Kerpan]

Shochiku policy at this point in time was to weaken the grip of the benshi -- by trying all sorts of methods (including scores recorded on discs). Ozu includes so much talkie-style dialog in his last silents that it took away most of the benshis' ability to "decorate" the film verbally. Naruse wanted to _make_ talkies (which is one reason he jumped to PCL), while Ozu wanted to develop a talkie-compatible style without having to be bothered by new-fangled sound cameras until he was ready to cope with them. Moreover, Shochiku's old silent studio was so close to a major train line that sound shooting was almost impossible. (Only Son was shot mostly at night -- when most trains were not running -- or running only infrequently).

I guess Walk Cheerfully is sort of "slap-dash", but in a way I really really like. I can't think of any other Ozu film that is _more_ fun to watch (though some others may equal it). Dragnet is a bit more serious, but visually almost as wild. I have always considered this to have the most thorough-going "virtual soundtrack" of any film I've seen -- so much so that no real score can fairly complete with Ozu's imaginary one.

[zedz]

That's a good observation about the 'virtual soundtrack'. In Dragnet Girl Ozu shows a complete mastery of visual rhythm, both in terms of montage and in coordinating movement within the frame with movement of the camera. Even with his utterly different, much more sedate mature style, he's still doing the same careful pacing of montage and movement, though in a more subdued fashion. (And when he does begin to use music, he uses it in a completely different way, and not as a way of underscoring or counterpointing his visual rhythms.)

[Michael Kerpan]

Another thing I especially love about Dragnet Girl, is the cumulative degradation of the state of the couple's apartment (reminds me of Bunuel's Extermination Angel). Things that get dropped or spilled or knocked over STAY messed up in subsequent scenes.

I never truly appreciated Sono yo no tsuma until I watched it (almost) frame by frame when doing my article. It really is remarkably coherent (cinematically -- despite a few story short cuts) and appealing.

[AidanKing]

I too have enjoyed all the releases in the BFI's Ozu collection and hope they are going to continue. I would agree with Michael K that the films in the latest collection are some of the most fun of Ozu's films and there's real pleasure in seeing a great artist work in a popular idiom without the quality of that art being in any way diminished. I suppose it could be argued that Ozu is the most entertaining of all the great film auteurs.

It would be nice if the BFI could move on to more Naruse once the Ozu collection has been completed now that it seems clear that there won't be any more Naruse from MoC.