YASUJIRO OZU: A CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION
NOTES OF A TOFU-SELLER: OZU ON FILMMAKING
October 4 - November 5, 2003
A Special Event of the 41st New York Film Festival
Sponsored by
Grand Marnier
Text compiled
by Derek Lam
(http://www.camerastylo.com).
If you watch an Ozu film not subtitled, believe me you understand what the
characters are saying -- Jim Jarmusch
ON HUMANNESS:
"What do I mean by character? Well, in a word, humanness. If you don't convey humanness, your work is worthless. This is the purpose of all art. In a film, emotion without humanness is a defect. A person who is perfect at facial expression is not necessarily able to express humanness. In fact, the expression of emotion often hinders the expression of humanness. Knowing how to control emotion and knowing how to express humanness with this control - that is the job of the director."
ON PLOT & STORY:
"Plot bores me."
"These days Noda and I don't rate story very highly. Content, social relevance, and story logic aren't what we're after....What we seek to leave is a good aftertaste."
ON ACTING:
"Get rid of all the dramatics and show a sad character; without using drama, make the audience feel the emotion."
On Bette Davis in The Little Foxes: "No facial expression or anything - just making tea without any emotion. The only thing you can hear is the click of the cup and saucer."
"Look at Henry Fonda in My Darling Clementine: motionless and expressionless - there is the greatness of John Ford. Fonda sits in a chair with his legs propped up on a pillar and a satisfied smile on his face - I really envy that rapport between Ford and Fonda."
"Skill at facial expression isn't enough. An actor who is good at making sad and happy faces - that is, an actor who has complete control of his facial muscles - is never sufficient. In fact those things are rather easy to do....But I don't care whether an actor can express emotion well or not. To me the important thing is character, to catch the humanness."
"You are not supposed to feel, you are supposed to do."
ON HIS CINEMA:
"I just want to make a tray of good tofu. If people want something different, they should go to the restaurants and department stores."
"I follow the general fashion in ordinary matters and moral laws in serious matters, but in art I follow myself. Therefore I won't do anything I don't want to do. Even if something is unnatural and I like it, I'll do it."
"I hope to make films which clearly show my own self."
"Although I may seem the same to other people, to me each thing I produce is a new expression, and I always make each work form a new interest. It's like a painter who always paints the same rose."
ON HIS STYLE:
Color: "People who like red are either geniuses or madmen....There are about ten different shades of red. When you look at this beer bottle, you can see the different shades and hues of color in its various parts. 'Form is nothing but emptiness and emptiness is nothing but form.' The Sanskrit word for 'form' is the same as the Chinese character for 'color.' "
Low camera angle: "Because the Japanese room has a lot of sliding doors, when you look down from too high a position, the horizon is lowered. If you frame as scene that way, the top part of the frame seems light and the balance looks wrong."
Crossing the axis and mismatched eyelines: "But it's all the same, isn't it? It doesn't make any difference, does it?"
ON WESTERN CRITICS:
"They don't understand - that's why they say it is Zen or something like that."
ON WESTERN AUDIENCES:
"Some day in the future my movies will appeal to foreigners....My films are describing what Japanese life is like."
ART EMBODIES LIFE::
On his deathbed: "Mr. President, it is after all the home drama, isn't it?"
Quotations from Bordwell, David. Ozu and the Poetics of Cinema. New Jersey: Princeton, 1988,
and Richie, Donald. Ozu. Berkeley: UC Press, 1974.
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