The Only Son / There Was a Father: Two Films by Yasujiro Ozu

The great auteur Yasujiro Ozu is often described as the most “Japanese” of Japanese directors due to his restrained style, quietly contemplative tone, and focus on conservative ideals and mores. This double-disc set brings together Ozu's first sound feature, The Only Son (1936), and There Was a Father (1942), one of his undisputed masterpieces. Both are dramas about duty and sacrifice—stories of widowed parents and only children—but with distinctively different contexts. The Only Son is a mother-son tale set during pre-WWII economic hard times, when the only shame greater than professional failure was falling short of parental expectations. There Was a Father, made when Japan entered World War II, is a father-son story in which the notion of individual happiness is subjugated to a larger duty to country. Presented with graceful formality and a bittersweet inevitability, these films exploring the collision of traditional culture and modernity are important works of Japanese cinema, offering distinctive portraits of 20th-century life. DVD extras include new video interviews with film historians David Bordwell, Kristin Thompson, and Tadao Sato, along with booklets featuring essays. Highly recommended. (S. Axmaker)