The Only Son

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william d Ozu flawless directorial style is on full display here, as is his storytelling. There is the slow build-up to a dramatic crossroads that sometime does not pay off for the time invested, but often does. This is one that does. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 03/31/23 Full Review Audience Member A beautiful & poignant film about a mother who gives her all to make sure her son has a decent education & attempt at a successful future. Years go by & she decides to visit her son who is living on the out skirts of Tokyo & not as successful as her presented. The film is full of many beautiful scenes especially the scene between the mother & son seated by the long grass & industry in the background discussing the hopes dashed in their lives. This is a truthful film brought alive by Japanese director Yashiro Ozu that stays with you. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 01/31/23 Full Review Audience Member Top class movie by a top class director. First talkie by Ozu is one of my all time favorites. Probably this must be the best movie about mother-son relationships that I have seen. Emotions are overwhelming and the simplicity of Ozu is the key. You can see every trademark of directors later movies, picture is beautifully shot, performances are top class, plot and fable are still modern and problematic to this day. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/27/23 Full Review Audience Member A sad and bittersweet movie about a mother who sacrifices for her son's future and a son who does not live up to her expectations. Rated 4.5/5 Stars •  Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 01/12/23 Full Review Audience Member I suspect that I may be missing some of the cultural nuances on which the plot of Ozu's first sound picture pivots. However, its broader strokes are easy enough to read and their emotional effects are universally understood. Basically, a poor widow sacrifices everything to ensure that her only son can get a good education. Later, when he is grown, she visits him in Tokyo from her country village, discovering that he has a wife and child. Unhappy with his status in life (as a night school teacher), the son hid these things from his mother so she wouldn't visit and discover this lack of success. As with the later Ozu films we know so well, there are quiet moments interspersed between scenes, showing "still life" shots or resting in the space after the actors have departed - these serve to heighten the emotion just expressed or allow us to reflect upon it. And there is Chishu Ryu, much younger than you might remember him but with the same laugh and easy manner, playing the son's former teacher who has also encountered a downward trajectory in his life. In fact, Japan's general trajectory may be downward in the 1930's and this may be one of Ozu's points (a few references to Germany, though ambiguous, may also represent editorial comments). In the end, however, this is another story about parents and their adult children and the fraught bonds that hold them together, for better or for worse, that Ozu told so well. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/04/23 Full Review Audience Member Ozu is the Japanese director whose simple films about the ordinary people of Japan are beloved and worshiped by the world's directors and film critics. Even though "Tokyo Story" is his acknowledged masterpiece, i much prefer this film, his first talkie. It's a simple story of a dirt poor, single mom who works overtime, to the point of aging herself prematurely, to pay the middle school and high school tuition of her only child. He grows up to be a part time teacher in Tokyo, and feels he is a failure because he hasn't done enough to make his mom proud. Actually, she is proud, but his low pay may not be enough to support his wife and newborn. He promises to go back to school to become a high school teacher. The film's ending is legendary to me because it seems prescient of the coming war. Did Ozu know World War two was coming?? I was shocked to find out the film was made in 1936. I had assumed it was a postwar work because of the final scene. But Ozu knew by then Japan was a militaristic society, and it wasn't long after this film that Japan did begin the invasion of Manchuria and China. The war of course would end the dreams and goals of these characters. The genius of the film is that Ozu tells the story of the majority of the Japanese people through these few , ordinary characters living simple lives. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/14/23 Full Review Read all reviews

The Only Son

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