Yasujiro Ozu

The End of Summer

The End of Summer

The Kohayakawa family is thrown into distress when childlike father Manbei takes up with his old mistress, in one of Ozu's most deftly modulated blendings of comedy and tragedy.

Film Info

  • Japan
  • 1961
  • 103 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.33:1
  • Japanese

Available In

Collector's Set

Eclipse Series 3: Late Ozu

Eclipse 3: Late Ozu

DVD Box Set

5 Discs

$55.96

The End of Summer
Cast
Ganjiro Nakamura
Manbei Kohayakawa
Setsuko Hara
Akiko
Yoko Tsukasa
Noriko
Michiyo Aratama
Fumiko
Keiji Kobayashi
Hisao
Masahiko Shimazu
Masao
Hisaya Morishige
Eiichiro Isomura
Chieko Naniwa
Tsune Sasaki
Reiko Dan
Yuriko
Chishu Ryu
Farmer
Haruko Sugimura
Shige Kato
Daisuke Kato
Yanosuke Kitagawa
Credits
Director
Yasujiro Ozu
Screenplay
Yasujiro Ozu
Screenplay
Kogo Noda
Producer
Sanezumi Fujimoto
Producer
Tadahiro Teramoto
Producer
Masakatsu Kaneko
Cinematography
Asakazu Nakai
Art direction
Tomoo Shimogawara
Music
Toshiro Mayuzumi
Editing
Koichi Iwashita

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Deeper into Ozu

Six writers celebrate the 120th anniversary of Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu’s birth by highlighting underacknowledged elements of his artistry and lesser-known gems in his oeuvre.

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Yasujiro Ozu

Writer, Director

Yasujiro Ozu
Yasujiro Ozu

Yasujiro Ozu has often been called the “most Japanese” of Japan’s great directors. From 1927, the year of his debut for Shochiku studios, to 1962, when, a year before his death at age sixty, he made his final film, Ozu consistently explored the rhythms and tensions of a country trying to reconcile modern and traditional values, especially as played out in relations between the generations. Though he is best known for his sobering 1953 masterpiece Tokyo Story, the apex of his portrayals of the changing Japanese family, Ozu began his career in the thirties, in a more comedic, though still socially astute, mode, with such films as I Was Born, But . . . and Dragnet Girl. He then gradually mastered the domestic drama during the war years and afterward, employing both physical humor, as in Good Morning, and distilled drama, as in Late Spring, Early Summer, and Floating Weeds. Though Ozu was discovered relatively late in the Western world, his trademark rigorous style—static shots, often from the vantage point of someone sitting low on a tatami mat; patient pacing; moments of transcendence as represented by the isolated beauty of everyday objects—has been enormously influential among directors seeking a cinema of economy and poetry.