Good Morning (1959)

[Scottie]

A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of intergenerational relationships, Good Morning (Ohayo) tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking as an act of resistance after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his childish protagonists. Shot in stunning Technicolor and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors’ new washing machine and unemployed men look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy reworks Ozu’s own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.

New 4K digital restoration from Shochiku Co., with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
I Was Born, But . . ., Yasujiro Ozu’s 1932 silent comedy masterpiece, with a score composed by Donald Sosin in 2008
Surviving excerpt from A Straightforward Boy, a 1929 silent film by Ozu
New video essay on Ozu’s use of humor by critic David Cairns
New interview with film scholar David Bordwell
New English subtitle translation
PLUS: An essay by critic Jonathan Rosenbaum

https://www.criterion.com/films/624-good-morning