Deptford Cinema presents a retrospective of the indelible Japanese auteur Yasujirô Ozu.
"A lighthearted take on director Yasujirô Ozu's perennial theme of the challenges of intergenerational relationships, Good Morning (Ohayo) tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking as an act of resistance after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his childish protagonists. Shot in stunning Technicolor and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbours' new washing machine and unemployed men look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy reworks Ozu's own silent classic I Was Born, But... to gently satirise consumerism in postwar Japan." The Criterion Collection
A bright Tokyo suburb buzzing with gossip is the backdrop to Ozu s cheerful comedy, Good Morning. Disillusioned with the seemingly meaningless talk of the adults around them, two brothers take a vow of silence when their parents refuse to buy them a television. With a dexterously woven plot, built on mishaps and misunderstandings, Good Morning pokes fun at the silliness of everyday chatter whilst gently acknowledging its fundamental necessity.
“Ozu’s sense of generational conflict in a society at risk from within is here at its sharpest and most anarchic.”
“Perhaps the most delightful of Yasujiro Ozu’s late comedies.”
- Director: Yasujirô Ozu
- Country: Japan
- Year: 1959
- Film Rating: U
- Run-time: 90 min
- Tickets £6/£4.50 conc
- Doors 3pm
- Film 3.30pm