The Ozu Diaries is a Yazujiro Ozu documentary for his fans (Film review)

Scene in Tokyo three years ago -- the year of the

120th anniversary of Yazujiro Ozu's birth

 

The Ozu Diaries (U.S.A., 2025)

-  Daniel Raim, director-scriptwriter

- Part of the HKIFF's Filmmakers and Filmmaking program 

 

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, there are fewer Japanese films than usual being screened at the Hong Kong International Film Festival this year.  But as it turned out, I've viewed the same amount of documentaries about Japanese subjects at the 50th HKIFF as I have Japanese films (which also included anime work The Lost Blossom along with the live action Meets the World).  

 

First up was Noh documentary The Path of Soul.  And then there's The Ozu Diaries, American filmmaker Daniel Raim's documentary about the late, great Yasujiro Ozu -- mainly in the Japanese auteur's own words (taken from his private journals but also letters) but supplemented by archival interviews and recollections by those who knew him (notably, Kinuyo Tanaka, the star of a number of his early works, scriptwriter Kogo Noda, child actor Tomio Aoki and Ozu's granddaughter, Akiko Ozu), and reflections on Ozu's works by Kiroshi Kurosawa, Wim Wenders, Luc Dardenne and Tsai Ming Liang.

 

Of the quartet of directors interviewed for the documentary, my sense is that the main contributions of the three non-Japanese ones was to emphasize Ozu's international influence and reputation.  However, I found it interesting and amusing to hear Kiyoshi Kurosawa talk about how he personally "discovered" the films of Ozu -- a director out of fashion at the time that the younger Japanese filmmaker decided to give Ozu's films a watch, beginning with the later, color talkies (rather than chronologically, with Ozu's silent black and white works).

 

In contrast, much appreciated colour along with insights were added by the inclusion of the interviews of those who had worked with Ozu; and I really liked that their recollections are of him as a person, not just a director.  Among other things, The Ozu Diaries reveals that he was a man who loved his sake, to dance and laugh, had Western as well as traditional Japanese ways about him, and who cared very much for -- and laughed a lot in the company of -- his mother. 

 

The Ozu Diaries covers a lot of ground, and even features excerpts from his diaries along with photographs and sketches from the time he spent as a conscripted soldier in Manchuria and Singapore.  It is worth noting though that Ozu expressly forbade the publication of at least one of his diaries from the war years.  And I do get the sense that Daniel Raim erred on the side of caution in terms of what he decided to include from those periods of Ozu's life in this documentary.  

 

Consequently, those looking for dirt to smear Ozu won't find it in this documentary by someone who surely ranks as a fan of the Japanese auteur.  Which, frankly, is a situation I think the vast majority of people attracted to go watch a documentary about Ozu would prefer.  For, after all, many cinephiles are attracted to the films of Ozu for their great humanity -- which often comes with far more doses of humour than those who still have yet to discover his works (some clips from which -- including home movies! -- are included in this documentary) realise.   

 

My rating for this film: 7.5