An Autumn Afternoon DVD 1962 秋刀魚の味, Sanma no aji / Directed by Yasujirō Ozu / Starring: Shima Iwashita, Chishū Ryū, Keiji Sada

UCP 4895033736097

REGION 3 NTSC DVD 

MADE IN Japan

AUDIO: Japanese 2.0

SUBTITLES: Chinese, English

Total Runtime: 112 minutes

English Summary:

An Autumn Afternoon (秋刀魚の味, Sanma no aji, "The Taste of sanma") is a 1962 Japanese drama film directed by Yasujirō Ozu. It stars Ozu regular Chishū Ryū as the patriarch of the Hirayama family who eventually realises that he has a duty to arrange a marriage for his daughter Michiko (Shima Iwashita). It was Ozu's last film; he died the following year on the day he turned 60.

okyo, 1962. Shūhei Hirayama (Chishū Ryū) is an aging widower with a 32-year-old married son, Kōichi (Keiji Sada), and two unmarried children, 24-year-old daughter Michiko (Shima Iwashita) and 21-year-old son Kazuo (Shin'ichirō Mikami). The ages of the children and what they respectively remember about their mother suggests that she died just before the end of the war, perhaps in the bombing of Tokyo in 1944-45. Since his marriage, Kōichi has moved out to live with his wife in a small flat, leaving Hirayama and Kazuo to be looked after by Michiko.

Hirayama and five of his classmates from middle-school, Kawai (Nobuo Nakamura), Horie (Ryūji Kita), Sugai (Tsūzai Sugawara), Watanabe (Masao Oda) and Nakanishi, hold regular reunions at a restaurant called Wakamatsu ("Young Pine"), which is owned by Sugai. They reminisce about old times and banter with each other. For example, Horie is teased about having a new young wife and asked whether he is taking pills to maintain his virility.

Japanese Summary:

これまでに小津安二郎が一貫して描いてきた、妻に先立たれた初老の父親と婚期を迎えた娘との関わりが、娘を嫁がせた父親の「老い」と「孤独」というテーマと共に描かれている。また、笠智衆演じる父親と中村伸郎、北竜二演じる友人たちとの応酬が喜劇味を加えている。

主演の笠は孤独な父親を見事に演じたほか、娘役の岩下志麻も快活な演技を披露し、それまでの小津作品とは違った味わいを醸し出している。『彼岸花』『秋日和』に続いて高橋とよが「若松の女将」役で出演している。

この作品を発表した翌年の1963年、小津監督は60歳の誕生日に亡くなったため、この作品が遺作となった。

Cast / キャスト

• Chishū Ryū as Shūhei Hirayama
• Shima Iwashita as Michiko Hirayama
• Keiji Sada as Kōichi Hirayama
• Mariko Okada as Akiko Hirayama
• Teruo Yoshida as Yutaka Miura
• Noriko Maki as Fusako Taguchi
• Shin'ichirō Mikami as Kazuo Hirayama
• Nobuo Nakamura as Shūzō Kawai
• Kuniko Miyake as Nobuko Kawai, his wife
• Eijirō Tōno as Seitarō Sakuma, "The Gourd"
• Haruko Sugimura as Tomoko Sakuma, his daughter
• Kyōko Kishida as the proprietor of the bar "Kaoru"
• Ryūji Kita as Shin Horie
• Michiyo Kan as Tamako, his second wife
• Daisuke Katō as Yoshitarō Sakamoto
• Tsūzai Sugawara as Sugai
• Masao Oda as Watanabe
• Toyo Takahashi as Waitress at "Wakamatsu"
• Shinobu Asaji as Yōko Sasaki, Shūhei's secretary
• Matsuko Shiga as Woman at Kōichi and Akiko's apartment
• Fujio Suga as First Tipsy Customer at "Kaoru"
• Zen'ichi Inagawa as Second Tipsy Customer at "Kaoru"