Tofu in Japan: La ricetta segreta del signor Takano

Director/screenwriter Mitsuhiro Mihara's 2023 plaintive father-daughter drama is a bit too on-the-nose to be compared favorably with the family drama classics of Yasujiro Ozu. In a story focused on Tatsuo, an aged tofu master in Onomichi and his singularly devoted daughter Haru, Mihara is clearly channeling Ozu's "Late Spring" and "Early Summer" in capturing the specificity of their close relationship. The plot plods along as each eventually finds prospective mates but not until a requisite number of comedy scenes with stock characters are played out quite broadly. The clownish moments felt like a different movie than the one that was intended. Regardless, screen veteran Tatsuya Fuji plays Tatsuo with curmudgeonly elan, while Kumiko Aso provides attentive assistance as Haru. Fuji's scenes with Kumi Nakamura as an ailing older woman were touching, though the ties with the A-bomb felt contrived to shoehorn more pathos into the film. For a film with similar sensibilities about the artistry behind uniquely Japanese food, I suggest watching Naomi Kawase's 2015 "An (Sweet Bean)".