Ozu Yasujiro

‘Views from One Foot above the Floor’

Ozu as auteur • Complete control of film-making in every stage

• The condition for being an auteur

• Ozu wrote all his late scripts with Noda Kogo and gave meticulous and final instructions on the production design and photography to his crew (Ozu Gumi) members.

Ozu as auteur

Mr. Ozu looked happiest when he was engaged in writing a scenario with Mr. Kogo Noda, at the latter's cottage on the tableland of Nagano Prefecture. By the time he finished writing a script, after about four months’ effort, he had already made up every image in every shot, so that he never changed the scenario after we went on the set. The words were so polished up that he would not allow us even a single mistake.

Ozu as auteur

• Ozu had most of things in his head: set designs, locations, compositions, lighting, camera positions, camera movements, acting, length of shots, the ways in which film is cut

• Once his style was established, he never changed it.

• Distinctive stylization

Ozu as auteur

• Ozu-gumi (the Ozu crew)• His crew members hardly changed. Only

possible in Japan’s studio system

Ozu as auteur

• Late Spring (1949)Producer: Yamamoto

TakeshiScript: Ozu Yasujiro

and Noda KogoCamera: Atsuta YuharuEditor: Hamamura

YoshiyasuMusic: Ito SenjiArt: Hamada Tatsuo

• Tokyo Monogatari (1953)

Producer: Yamamoto Takeshi

Script: Ozu Yasujiro and Noda Kogo

Camera: Atsuta YuharuEditor: Hamamura

YoshiyasuMusic: Saito KojunArt : Hamada Tatsuo

Ozu as auteur

• Equinox Flower(1958)Producer: Yamamoto

TakeshiScript: Ozu Yasujiro and

Noda KogoCamera: Atsuta YuharuEditor: Hamamura

YoshiyasuMusic: Saito Kojun Art: Hamada Tatsuo

• Autumn Afternoon(1962)

Producer: Yamanouchi Shizuo

Script: Ozu Yasujiro and Noda Kogo

Camera: Atsuta YuharuEditor: Hamamura

YoshiyasuMusic: Saito Kojun Art: Hamada Tatsuo

Ozu as auteur • Photographer: Atsuta Yuharu

• Atsuta was an assistant cameraman for Ozu for 6 years and his first photographer for 25 years from 1937 (What Did the Lady Forget?) to 1962. After Ozu’s death he did not work for any other director.

Ozu as auteur • Ozu was the only director for whom Atsuta operated his camera. Atsuta had learned what Ozu wanted before he became the first cameraman and he did not need any instruction.

• Complete grasp of Ozu’s intentions.

• Tokyo-ga

Ozu as auteur

Though years’ experience as an assistant … I’ve learned what Ozu wanted. I didn’t bother to ask him about the camera position; Occasionally he said, “I don’t like to look down on people. A down shot makes me feel as though I’m looking down. So I like the camera on the horizontal.”

-- Atsuta Yuharu

Ozu as auteur Noda Kogo• He co-wrote with Ozu the 13

scripts of the 15 post-war films.

• For Ozu the script is to a film director as the blueprint is to an architect.

- Avoid ‘dramatic’ plots- Ordinary stories of ordinary people- Birth, growth, marriage, aging and death – ‘the wheel of life’

Ozu as auteur

• Scripts written jointlyby Ozu and Noda

• Few instructions of actionappeared on the scripts and no indications of shotsizes, angles, points of view, camera movements, lightings etc. Everything was already in Ozu’s head. Once a scenario is completed, not a single word is added or taken away (almost!)

Ozu as auteur

• Saito Kojun provided music for Ozu’s major post-war films. Tokyo Story, Early Spring, Tokyo Twilight, Equinox Flower, Floating Weed, Late Autumn, Autumn Afternoon

• Light music style with restrained emotional appeal• Give the film distinctive mood and atmosphere

Ozu as auteur

Music from Tokyo Story

Opening music of Late Autumn

Ozu as auteur

Title and credit scene Letters written in a writing brush against hemp cloth

Ozu as auteur • Hamamura Yoshiyasu• Ozu’s editor for his major films• Quiet editing • One shot lasts from 2 seconds

to 10 seconds: no extremely short or long

• In the shot-reverse-shot, a shot is timed according to the length of dialogue

• Tokyo Story, Autumn Afternoon 1, Autumn Afternoon 2

• Still-life shots in uniform length

Ozu as auteur

• Ozu kept using the same actors: Ryu Chishu, Hara Setsuko, Sugimura Haruko, Tanaka Kinuyo, Yamamura So, Nakamura Nobuo, Tono Eijiro

• Ozu completely dictates the ways in which actors deliver dialogues and act, allowing them no freedom and improvisation.

Ozu as auteur

• Performers who appeared regularly in Ozu’s filmsunderstood his intentions and filming methods completely.

Ozu as auteur

• More regular faces in Ozu’s films.• Tanaka Kinuyo and Sugimura Haruko

Ozu as auteur

• Rigid, artificial action - lack of spontaneity (both strength and weakness)

• Ozu won complete trust from actors• Stylized ‘beauty’ - sense of order

Ozu operating the camera by himself

Tokyo-ga interview of Atsuta Yuharu

Ozu editing the film himself.

Ozu directing performanceTokyo-ga interview of Ryu Chishu

Ozu directing performance

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

Style derives from the consistent use of certain techniques.

Mise-en-scène - Motionless camera - Low-level camera placement (one foot

above the floor) - One lens (with focal length of 50mm, a slight telephoto, the focal length of the normal lens 35mm)

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• The camera placed about one foot from the floor - low level shots without moving the camera (no pans or travelling)

• Only slight low-angle

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

- Horizontal compositionc.f. Mizoguchi’s diagonal composition

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• Composition - horizontal and (slight) low angle while Mizoguchi’s favourite composition is diagonal and high-angle

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• Perspectival placement of a group of people• Careful, geometrical arrangement of screen

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• - Frontal composition: actors (almost) directly looking at and talking to the camera

• Unconventional and against classic film making rules

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• More frontal compositions

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• More frontal composition

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• Frontal compositions• Faces turned to the camera

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

Uniform set design• Middle-class Japanese household• Shoji (sliding paper door) wide open and shallow

perspective with background view is partly blocked by a wall.

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• More examples of Ozu’s favourite interior design• Empty tatami in foreground, figures in the

middle ground and a small garden and wall at the background

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• The same interior design consistently used

Ozu’s Visual Style (Mise-en-scène)

• Japanese architecture and horizontal composition• The camera’s straight-on, horizontal angle and

low position creates horizontal composition.• Lack of depth - shallow composition

Ozu’s Colour Films

• The same mise-en-scéne is employed in colour films

• Repeated uses of the same colour - red

Ozu’s Colour Films

Ozu’s Colour Films

• Red is used in ‘pillow’ shots

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

Montage (Editing) - Rhythmic editing (nearly fixed lengths of

shots according to shot sizes and lengths of diaologues)

‘Ozu’s low camera position is not for long takes. It makes a rhythm from a combination of medium long shot, and reverse medium-long shot. Consequently, how long one shot lasts becomes very important.

- Cuts - no dissolve, fade or wipe

Fade (in)

Wipe

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Almost perfect visual match in shot-and-reverse-shots

• Drinking sake from the cup held in the right hand; matching waistcoats and ties; the same hair-style; the pillar at their back on the screen right.

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Even the position of the beer bottle is the same, on the right of each character and the label of the beer is facing to the camera in either shot.

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)• ELLIPSIS - narrative device used in literature to

leave out a (large) portion of an action, an event or situation.

• Ozu frequently uses this device.• The viewer learns of important narrative events

only after they have occurred.• Tokyo Story: The viewer does not see the

grandmother falls ill - the viewer knows it only when her son and daughter receive a telegram; her death taking place between scenes: in one scene, they are at her bedside and in the next they are mourning her death

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

- ‘Pillow shots’ or ‘still life shots’ which are not directly related with narratives and function as transitional insertions.

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Pillow shot – an non-diegetic punctuation shot inserted between two sequences in Ozu’s films.

• Inviting (philosophical) interpretations of their purpose and function.

• Late Spring

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Noriko gets a phone call at work telling that her mother-in-law is ill; medium shot of her at desk with sound of typewriters

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Cut to a low-angle shot of a building under construction with riveting machine sounds and music

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Cut to another shot of the construction site with the same sounds

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Then a cut to Koichi’s clinic with his sister, Shige present. The new scene begins.

Ozu’s Visual Style (Montage)

• Meanings of pillow shot• Contemplative and aesthetic • Related to story-telling mechanism: frequent

uses of ellipsis (a segment of a narrative is deliberately omitted)

• Pillow shot indicates that an ellipsis occurs.

Ozu’s Film Style

Ignoring the standard continuity editing - 180 degree rule - Omission of the establishing shot - using space of 360 degrees

Ozu’s Montage: the 180 degree rule

Ozu comfortably ignores the 180 degree rule: a man drinking tea facing towards the frame right

Ozu’s Montage: the 180 degree rule

In the next shot, the man facing the frame left. A grave mistake in the classical montage style

Meanings of Ozu’s visual styleRestrained and minimalist cinematic style

• Ozu’s film style is often compared to Zen- ‘Ozu’s simplicity of style derives from the fact that his art is essentially religious in nature. It is an art predicated on the Zen Buddhism…’ David A. Cook- Mystery of the everyday

‘… it is only through the mundane and the common that the transcendent can be expressed.’ Donald Ritchie

Meanings of Ozu’s visual style

- Contemplative and meditative quality; the expression of quietness, motionless, emptiness and nothingness

Meanings of Ozu’s visual style

• Empty frame – an action ends and an empty frame is left – great emotional resonance

Meanings of Ozu’s visual style

- Self-abandonment yielding to fate and destiny without conscious struggle

- The tombstone of Ozu’s grave – ‘ 無’ Nothing

Meanings of Ozu’s visual style

• How much are Ozu’s images religious expression?

• How closely are Ozu’s films related with Zen Buddhism and its spirit?