Watch Early Spring For Free

So much average

Did you people see the same film I saw?

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

I consider Yasujiro Ozu one of the worlds most significant and distinctive directors, a man who eschews false dazzle in favor of examining the human condition, human relationships; most of his films are quietly incisive portraits of people coming to conclusions and making decisions which will permanently affect their lives. Ozu imparts subtlety to his characters, his sense of time and place are impeccable, and his respect for his characters unparalleled. All of that said, I think that Early Spring is one of his least effective--one easily sees the point he makes about corporate behavior and marital infidelity, but this one, rather than quietly contemplative, struck me as merely slow. The characters too often lack any redeeming qualities, and yet we are apparently supposed to care about them for more than two hours, difficult when there is so little to work with--Early Spring is certainly not a stinker, by any means, but for me, a lesser Ozu, and if you want to start with something more characteristic, begin with either version of Floating Weeds, or with his masterpiece, Tokyo Story.

This is another 'slice of life' film from famed Japanese director Yasujirô Ozu. The protagonist is Shoji Sugiyama, a late 30s 'salary man' (white collar office worker), who lives in Tokyo with his devoted wife, Masako. The couple had a child who died (for unknown reasons) and they now appear to resign themselves to being a childless couple for the rest of their marriage.Ozu spends a good deal of time also focusing on Sugi's colleagues at the office. One major theme is dissatisfaction. There is little chance that any of the workers have a chance to advance to a higher position and all seem to agree that it's very difficult making ends meet on such a low salary. Prospects for retirement are even more dim, given the virtually non-existent retirement benefits. Nonetheless, the workers try to make the best of their drab and routine lives by engaging in communal activities such as 'noodle parties' and trips to the beach.It's on one such trip to the beach, when Sugi gets to know a younger office worker, 'Goldfish', played by Keiko Kishi (the super attractive Kishi can be seen in middle age in the acclaimed 1983 film, 'The Makioka Sisters'). She aggressively goes after Sugi and they end up having a brief affair. The rest of the film focuses on the conflict between Sugi and Masako, after she gets wind of the affair, and how they eventually resolve the conflict.Ozu wisely does not simply focus on the conflict between the two principals, but also brings in other characters, that depict the wider canvas of the community. Two strong scenes come to the mind: first, after Sugi's get together with some war veteran buddies, he invites two of them home and in perhaps the film's most comic scene, the two make fools of themselves, as they are completely intoxicated; a later more dramatic scene, features the male office workers castigating Goldfish, for her rumored affair with Sugi. What's interesting about this scene is how Goldfish steadfastly denies any involvement with Sugi, despite our knowledge to the contrary.The major problem with 'Early Spring' is its slow pace. It's a good half hour before the break into the second act, the aforementioned extra-marital affair, actually occurs. Ozu also throws in a seemingly unnecessary sub-plot of the dying co-worker, Miura. Is the point to introduce the more universal theme of the 'fragility of life' or to suggest that this particular officer worker was freed from the shackles of a lifetime of drudgery as a devoted 'salary man'? Whatever the case, it simply is dragged out and goes on for much too long.While Sugi and Goldfish's affair may have been risqué for its time, the resolution is markedly more staid. After Goldfish gives up on 'stalking' Sugi (she has a number of 'meltdowns' in front of Sugi, when it's clear he's no longer interested in her), eventually she shakes his hand at a farewell party and now has given up on the idea of pursuing him.As for Masako, against her mother's advice, she decides to leave Sugi, to teach him a lesson. Eventually, after Sugi is transferred to a provincial town, she takes her mother's advice to 'not make things worse' and joins him there and agrees with him, to 'start over'. If only more couples in America were willing to follow Sugi and Masako's course of action, martial disputes that occur here, might have better resolutions.I ended up watching 'Early Spring' a second time and found it more absorbing upon second viewing. Nonetheless, this is a film that still needed quite a bit of judicious editing. The running time of 145 minutes is way too long for a film that could have been 45 minutes shorter.

Seeing this film is more like looking at a photo album than watching a movie. Characters seem to walk in and out of set scenes, speaking while in the set, and then it is on to the next photo. Some concession need be made for a black and white film from 1956 and for the style of Yasujiro Ozo, yet this approach to film making seems to destroy the continuity of the film. For example, one jumps from tones of Japanese industrial society (340,000 office workers in one city) to hiking on a highway to sitting and drinking tea. This may in fact be the thread of industrial postWWII Japan, but it seems not the fabric. The result appears to be a lack of a coherent Japanese identity, for costumes and jobs appear not to be enough to transcend the disruptive nature of the editing. Ozu is the master of the set scene, but the editing appears disjointed rather than cohesive. There also seems to be a dependence on American stage production rather than Japanese movie making. One cannot help be see a relation between this film and the stage plays of Tennessee Williams and of Arthur Miller. I seem to get the feeling I am watching a Japanese docu-melodrama in Italian neo-realism. I half expect to see Burt Lancaster leap into one of the scenes. The Left Elbow Index considers seven variables of film--acting, film continuity, character development, dialogue, production sets, and plot. The acting is average since there seems to be little more to do than sit and talk. The film continuity is also rated as average, despite the what seems to be disjointed action and time. The character development and plot need help. There is little verbo-robots can become, and the plot of infidelity in marriage seems always to follow the same course, with minor personal variations. The production sets are rated average since in black and white most sets are simply degrees of gray. Average is the rating given to the dialogue. It is functional but appears to lack insight. The best line is "Babies come quicker than raises." The artistry rates average, again color would help, as it does in Ozu's THE END OF SUMMER. The overall LEI average is 3.83, raised to 4 in tribute to Ozu's reputation, which equates to a 6 on the IMDb scale. I recommend the film, it is worth watching as an integral part of film history, keeping in mind that the best of Japanese films have not yet arrived in 1956.

Early spring is a time to renew one's hopes, to believe once again that happiness is possible. Sometimes that hope takes the form of betrayal: an extra-marital affair may appear to be the answer to a life that is insufferably routinized and devoid of the thrill of adventure. The "salaryman" (in the US: "white-collar worker") is someone especially vulnerable: he enters the corporation filled with hope for his future, but, we are told, he soon discovers only disillusionment and "dissatisfaction" (a word that surfaces throughout the film). There are, of course, the blandishments of Japan's new consumer society: Note the presence of posters advertising foreign destinations throughout the film (Paris, Colombia, Finland); and note the reference to the withering of the plum trees (Japan's own) on a rich man's estate while bouganvilleas (a foreign import) thrive. But there's little to indicate that Ozu thinks these foreign bagatelles can bring happiness. Indeed, the film has a spareness about it, reflecting a world that has yet to become hopelessly cluttered with objects, which is, as we know too well, the other (the American) solution to dissatisfaction and disillusionment in human relationships and work. Each character tries to shape a life of work and relationships into something satisfying, but there's no simple formula to be found here for happiness in the modern world. There is only the dignity (or lack of dignity) of each individual in their attempt to find happiness. Ozu has brought to life characters who never gush in emotion, who don't even touch one another in the most intimate of reunions (the final husband and wife scene), and whose very restraint makes us feel all the more strongly about them. We feel honored to have shared a part of their lives.