Sommerblüten (1958)

Sommerblüten: Directed by Yasujirô Ozu. With Shin Saburi, Kinuyo Tanaka, Ineko Arima, Yoshiko Kuga. A businessman clashes with his elder daughter over her choice of a husband.

“The emptiness of the space in the very first images of u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; makes an impact on the viewer. An opening of this sort resembles those of Ozuu0026#39;s most famous films such as u0026quot;Late Springu0026quot; and u0026quot;Tokyo Storyu0026quot;. However, soon we find out that u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; differs quite remarkably from these since it is essentially a comedy. In the first scene of the film Ozu instantly introduces the marriage motif — a recurring subject in his oeuvre — as two railroad workers are wondering the great amount of newly-weds. Only few artists have been able to establish a theme and set a tone, which are fully consistent with the rest of the work, so quickly yet still with such restraint and precision. Therefore, it is certain to the viewer from the start that what unfolds is the craft of a master. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAt its heart, u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; is a tender comedy because it fluently combines two aspects, which too often appear as contradictory, the ironic and the melancholic. Striking is also the fact that the film is Ozuu0026#39;s first comedy in approximately two decades. One must go back to the silent days to find a benchmark. This choice of return seems to coincide with Ozuu0026#39;s new sympathy (though I use the word hesitantly) for the younger generation, whereas he so often has sympathized the elders. It seems to me that in u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; the lightness and hopeful attitude towards life, noticeable in Ozuu0026#39;s earlier films, merges with the Chekhovian wisdom and elegiac tone of his later oeuvre. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eTo an extent, u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; is a satirical treatise on the decline of parental and especially patriarchal authority in the Japanese family and society. However, Ozu is never hostile nor aggressive. He doesnu0026#39;t point out. He reveals. Although there are moments when Ozu lets us laugh at the protagonistu0026#39;s helplessness when trapped by his own outdated norms, Ozu never attacks on him. In addition to theme, Ozuu0026#39;s return to comedy also marked a turning point in his visual development because he used color for the first time, which later on became an inseparable element in his subsequent films. As a consequence, the world of colors in u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; is strikingly rich and precisely considered, leaving the viewer with several memorable and widely associative visual motifs. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eu0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; is in many ways what one might call a simple film. Thereu0026#39;s not much of a story going on, let alone action of any kind, nor surprising twists in plot. Nonetheless, the viewer (any viewer whether an admirer of Ozu or not) is left with a powerful impact by the rich simplicity of the visuals; and the utter beauty of details. Above all, u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; is purely based on Ozuu0026#39;s unique poetry of the mundane; a vital principle in his cinema. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eDue to this simplicity, many western viewers have blamed, or at least explained their discontent, Ozuu0026#39;s films for a slow pace, but this criticism, however, doesnu0026#39;t really hit the mark because Ozuu0026#39;s films precisely create their own time in the poetic universe which differs from our world. In this rhythm or, in fact, Ozuu0026#39;s perception of time lies profound melancholy. The days go by, the clothes line dances in the wind, and emptiness prevails. In u0026quot;Equinox Floweru0026quot; the older generation remembers the war-time days, recalling especially its better times of carefree coexistence. In turn, such ideals as personal happiness and privacy threatened by the old, arranged, communal joy throb beneath the youthu0026#39;s dialogue. Ozuu0026#39;s characters are often aware of this melancholy — human transience in the passage of time — which brings sadness to their existence. A sensation that the old is about to vanish is always present, though so is the charactersu0026#39; ability to accept things as they are. As time is such an important theme for Ozu, his films can never be summed up with mere concepts such as u0026quot;comedyu0026quot; or u0026quot;tragedyu0026quot; since their (aesthetic) perspective is never restricted, but always reach to the most profound perspective of all, which is that of philosophy.”