“Let me part tonight as his uncle, as before. Next time I come back here I’ll be a good actor”

There is something fundamentally human about Yasujirō Ozu‘s films. Low-key, underplayed and melancholic, both Floating Weeds and the more famous Tokyo Story (1953) drill down into the personal nature of the protagonists but in such a subtle way that you are unaware of experiencing anything profound. The characteristic Ozu visual touches are all present: the static shots, the low-set camera, the mathematically precise framing. In this film the addition of colour give an autumnal edge despite with story being set in summer.

The plot is more complex than the ‘there and back again’ Tokyo Story. A past-it’s-prime theatre troupe arrive in a small town by the sea. The lead actor, Komajuro, visits an old flame and her son (his son as well – although only the actor and his mistress know this). This reunion kindles old flames and aggravates Komajuro’s current girlfriend Sumiko. Sumiko launches a series of schemes and tests to uncover the affair, and in doing so Komajuro’s son discovers the truth.

Superficially this is all twists and turns, but in Ozu’s hands you are never far from the heart of the story. Beyond all the romantic entanglement and revelations about the past is a story about age, love and life decisions. Like Tokyo Story, it’s a film that goes beyond simply telling a slice of drama from the past, instead it narrates a more universal set of emotional and existential issues.

Watch this in a double bill with Tokyo Story, and then just carry on with Ozu’s other films as I’m planning to do.