Frau Oyu

Heart-wrenching and sad tale of love and sacrifice under harsh traditional rules is told in beautiful, lyrical black-and-white imagery and the cast perform excellently throughout, especially Kinuyo Tanaka in the title role.

Kenji Mizoguchi's movie 'Miss Oyu' is simply masterful. It is based on a short story (The reed cutter) by Junichiro Tanizaki. But, while the motives and the emotions of the protagonists in the short story are sometimes rather ambiguous, they are totally purified in the screenplay. The protagonists exemplify traditional family roles and are confronted with these traditions, like in this movie a widow with children. She cannot remarry, because she must stay in her husband's family home to raise her children.

The main topic of the movie is forbidden love, and more generally the impossibility of being happy in this world, which are very characteristic themes in Kenji Mizoguchi's films. The film illustrates also some typical aspects of J. Tanizaki's work, like the 'physical' (facial) influence of a mother on the future emotional life of her son, or the fear of scandal and of losing one's face in society.

This film shines through the purity and the intensity of the emotions of the protagonists (hidden for a long time, they erupt violently), through the marvelous performances of the actors and through its forceful message about the all importance of love. A must see.

Shinnosuke accepts to marry Shizu in order to be closer to her sister, a widowed wife and mother of a son. Shizu proposes him marriage because doing so would mean staying near her sister, not marrying him and marrying another man would mean to separate from her. Japanese customs forbid Oyu (shizu's sister) to marry another man because it is her duty to educate his son for him to become one day the head of her deceased husband family. Oyu has the same feelings Shinnosuke has for her, so the marriage between him and her sister allows them to be together apparently with no suspicion. The three of them develop a strange bond.

There's really not much to say about the technical aspects in this film, if you know Mizoguchi's directing you know you're in good hands. Anyway though, as usual, the scenes are beautifully shot. I even found myself really liking the music here, it adds perfectly to the atmosphere.

Overall, this is another another great film from Mizoguchi that's worth the time.

Set in contemporary Japan to the director, specifically in Kyoto, the film tells the story of a young man who falls in love with his wife's widowed older sister. This triggers a deep triangle of feelings and drama that the director stages with his unique style of theatricality and artistic attention to every scene. Much refinement in the way of treating the story and psychological attention to the characters who are immersed in a country and a society where living and loving completely seems almost impossible.. One of the most beautiful films by Mizoguchi that I have seen. The character of Mrs. Oyu stands out strongly for her charm and remains very much as an image.

For a few moments, Truffaut's film Jules and Jim from 1962 immediately came to mind.

A man falls in love with the sister of his bride-to-be, but all parties involved are bound by societal constraints. The film has the usual stunning cinematography, with graceful tracking moves and elegant framing. The story is engaging, easy to follow and doesn't drag. It's an all-around good movie. But as I've said before, lately I'm getting bored with Mizoguchi. His films just don't thrill me like they used to. It gets kind of tiresome to watch people hang their heads and bemoan their situations all the time. I get that the point is they're being repressed by archaic social expectations, but it'd be nice to see a little more resistance. Everyone is so damn passive. Again, it's a well-crafted film but one that doesn't really inspire a lot of sympathy for the characters.