Yasujiro Ozu & Setsuko Hara

Yasujiro Ozu was one of the greatest film directors in Japan, nay in the world itself. His films were completely different both in content & form from those of his famous contemporary, Akira Kurosawa. While Kurosawa used Western contemporary film techniques to depict Japanese themes, Ozu developed his own technique to depict traditional Japanese family life, centered mostly around the mother. There was a personal reason for this. Ozu was very close to his mother, lived with her, never married & survived less than two years after her death. Though "Tokyo Story" is his most well-known film, his first colour film "Equinox Flower" is probably the quintessential Ozu film. The "Tatami shot", with the camera placed on the ground at the eye level of a kneeling Japanese on a Tatami (mat) was his trademark.

Setsuko Hara (1920-2015) was a Japanese actress who had appeared in 67 films (including those with Kurosawa) before she started working with Ozu. She made 6 films with him in 12 years. Like Ozu, she never married & was known as "The Eternal Virgin" in Japanese cinema. When Ozu died, she stopped acting & became a recluse (like Greta Garbo.) Shusaku Endo, the Japanese author, wrote after watching one of her films "Can it possible that there is such a woman in this world?"