and wrote poetry.
He was anxious to be a film director.
That much is certain.
In 1923, his sister Toki
graduated in Matsuzaka.
Ozu left his teaching position
and moved back to Tokyo with her,
reuniting the family once again.
Here, Ozu jumped at
the coveted chance to work in film.
On August 1, 1923,
he started working at Shochiku Films'
Kamata Studios as an assistant cameraman.
It was the summer
of his 20th year.
Was his father opposed?
Yes, he was. Being old-fashioned,
he didn't approve at first.
What did he want him to be?
NOBUZO OZU - BROTHER
TOKU YAMASHITA - SISTER
I don't know exactly what
our father wanted him to be.
In those days, filmmakers
weren't well thought of.
Back then, filmmaking was hardly
considered a respectable profession.
But your mother reacted differently?
She did, didn't she?
But there wasn't anything
she could do about it.
There wasn't?
No. He wanted to do it so badly.
There was no alternative
but to let him do
what he wanted so badly.
A month after Ozu started work
at Kamata Studios,
the great Kanto earthquake
took place, on September 1st.
His home in Fukagawa
burned down.
Ozu walked all the way home
from Kamata, arriving at night.
Remembering those days, Ozu said,
''The only director over 30 back then
was Hotei Nomura.
My mother saw a Yasujiro Shimazu film,
and she thought it was mine.
She said,
'Yasujiro even changed his name to Shimazu,
because he's so ashamed of his job. '''
In 1924, he passed his induction exam
for military service.
He was conscripted into
the Tokyo Fourth Infantry Regiment.
He was not very good at training,
but he was smart.
As the time for drills approached,
he made sure the doctor would
find something wrong with him
and thus managed to be
excused from exercises.
A year later, he was discharged
with the rank of sergeant.
He returned to Shochiku Films.
In 1927,
the head of the studio, Shiro Kido,
assigned him to direct period films.
His first film was
The Sword of Penitence.
Ozu was 24 years old.
This was four years after
he'd started working for Shochiku.
Mrs. Akira Fushimi,
your husband's first scripts with Ozu -
Couple on the Move
and Days of Youth.
Back then, directors got along very well
with the writers, didn't they?
Yes, very well.
If they couldn't make it home,
they'd stay at each other's houses.
Most of them
were in their 20s or 30s,
so for them, filmmaking was like
having the time of your life.
Yes. He used to come by
to wake us up at 10:00 at night.
- Ozu did?
- Yes, leading the others.
He used to show up singing loudly
in front of the house.
''Well, Ozu's here again.''
We would open the window,
and he'd yell, ''Wake up.''
So we'd open the door
and in they'd come.
Usually they didn't
drink that much, though.
He just sang to wake you up?
At this point, Ozu's partnership
with cameraman Hideo Mohara
had already begun.
They went on to make
the ''college''series of films-
I Graduated, But..., I Flunked, But...,
College is a Nice Place, and so on.
In those days,
there were two papers:
The ''Sunday'' Daily
and The Weekly Asahi.
Those were the only two back then.
The hero graduates from college,
but there are no jobs.
His fiancйe comes to town.
So he pretends he has a job.
He leaves the house with his lunch box,
then goes to sit in a field and eat.
For him,
every day is like Sunday.
That's what
The ''Sunday'' Daily represents.
There's a close-up
that conveys the whole idea.
YASU SASAKI - SCREENWRITER
I still remember how well that worked.
He used that newspaper well.
Besides that, there's pathos.
From that time on, critics noticed
this quality in Ozu's films.
Almost all of his films were like this.
Years later, Ozu said,
''I made a lot of films about students.
A young director using young actors
I FLUNKED, BUT...
is usually limited to stories
about students or company clerks.
Young clerks are always limited
to certain kinds of jobs.
And back