Ozu 121
New Restoration

Ozu in optimistic mode, which is not to say that loss and resignation don’t figure in large part (no filmmaker has ever had a surer grasp of the melancholy of everyday things), just that here the generosity of spirit seems irresistible—and irresistibly comic.”

Tom Charity, Time Out

Bittersweet, comedic, and fable-like, Record of a Tenement Gentleman is Ozu’s first postwar picture and his final collaboration with screenwriter Ikeda Tadao. A boy found wandering the streets of bombed-out Tokyo is foisted upon Otane (Iida Choko), a cantankerous aging widow with an aversion to children. She gradually grows to love the stoic waif—lice and bed wetting notwithstanding. In master Ozu’s sure hands, this seemingly sentimental story idea is given a decidedly unsentimental and often humorous treatment. Ozu mainstay Ryu Chishu is memorable as the singing fortune teller who sets the tale in motion. The film marked Ozu’s return to studio filmmaking after being conscripted to shoot propaganda in Singapore during WWII. (What footage was shot, Ozu burned.) Its light comic touch belies a starkly contemporaneous portrait of an impoverished but humanity-clinging community trying to rebuild itself with the nation. This gorgeous new restoration premiered at Cannes Classics in 2023.

In Japanese with English subtitles

The December 12 screening will include Ozu 121” opening-night remarks by The Cinematheque’s Artistic Director Shaun Inouye.

A warm comedy of life in postwar Japan … Ozu deflects the sentimental thrust of the material by taking it all in through his passive, profoundly accepting point of view.”

Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader

A deceptively simple story in the manner typical of the most powerful of his films.”

Michael Price, Senses of Cinema
Media

Upcoming in this Series

  • Record Of A Tenement Gentleman 1
  • Record of a Tenement Gentleman
  • 長屋紳士録
  • Japan1947
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 72 DCP
  • NR
  • Late Spring 1
  • Late Spring
  • 晩春
  • Japan1949
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 108 DCP
  • G
  • Hen In The Wind 1
  • A Hen in the Wind
  • 風の中の牝鶏
  • Japan1948
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 84 DCP
  • NR
  • Munekata Sisters 1
  • The Munekata Sisters
  • 宗方姉妹
  • Japan1950
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 112 DCP
  • NR
  • Tokyo Story 1
  • Tokyo Story
  • 東京物語
  • Japan1953
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 137 DCP
  • PG
  • Early Spring 1
  • Early Spring
  • 早春
  • Japan1956
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 145 DCP
  • NR
  • Good Morning 1
  • Good Morning
  • お早よう
  • Japan1959
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 93 DCP
  • G
  • Equinox Flower 3
  • Equinox Flower
  • 彼岸花
  • Japan1958
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 118 DCP
  • NR
  • Floating Weeds 1
  • Floating Weeds
  • 浮草
  • Japan1959
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 119 DCP
  • NR
  • End Of Summer 1
  • The End of Summer
  • 小早川家の秋
  • Japan1961
  • Ozu Yasujiro
  • 103 DCP
  • G