Kohayagawa-ke no aki (1961)

User Rating:

8.0/10   

Director:

Yasujiro Ozu

Writers:

Kôgo Noda (screenplay) &
Yasujiro Ozu (screenplay)

Release Date:

February 1962 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot Keywords:

Heart Attack | Extramarital Affair | Honor

Awards:

1 win & 1 nomination

Cast

Ganjiro Nakamura	...	Kohayagawa Banpei
Setsuko Hara	...	Akiko
Yôko Tsukasa	...	Noriko, second daughter
Michiyo Aratama	...	Fumiko, eldest daughter
Keiju Kobayashi	...	Hisao, Fumiko's husband
Masahiko Shimazu	...	Masao, thier son
Hisaya Morishige	...	Isomura Eiichirou
Chieko Naniwa	...	Sasaki Tsune
Reiko Dan	...	Yuriko, her daughter
Haruko Sugimura	...	Katou Shige
Daisuke Katô	...	Kitagawa Yanosuke
Haruko Togo	...	Kitagawa Teruko
Yumi Shirakawa	...	Nakanishi Takako
Akira Takarada	...	Teramoto Tadashi
Kakyu Sazan	...	Yamaguchi, Chief clerk
Yu Fujiki	...	Maruyama Rokutarou
Chishu Ryu	...	Farmer
Tatsuo Endo	...	Banpei's brother
Yûko Mochizuki	...	Farmer's wife
Asao Uchida	...	Isha (doctor)

Directed by
Yasujiro Ozu

Writing credits
Kôgo Noda		(screenplay) &
Yasujiro Ozu		(screenplay)

Produced by
Sanezumi Fujimoto	....	producer
Masakatsu Kaneko	....	producer
Tadahiro Teramoto	....	producer

Original Music by
Toshirô Mayuzumi

Cinematography by
Asakazu Nakai

Film Editing by
Koichi Iwashita

Production Design by
Tomoo Shimogawara

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Shigekichi Takemae	....	assistant director

Sound Department
Koichi Nakagawa	....	sound
Hisashi Shimonaga	....	sound mixer

Production Companies

• Toho Company

Distributors

• Toho Company (1961) (Japan) (theatrical)
• Artificial Eye (2003) (UK) (theatrical) (re-release)
• British Film Institute (BFI) (1962) (UK) (theatrical)
• New Yorker Films (1970) (USA) (theatrical) (as "The End of Summer")
• Rosebud (2004) (Greece) (theatrical)
• Toho Company (1962) (USA) (theatrical) (subtitled)
• Criterion Collection, The (2007) (USA) (DVD) (English subtitles) (as Eclipse from the Criterion Collection)

Also Known As:

Autumn for the Kohayagawa Family (literal English title)
Early Autumn
The End of Summer (International: English title)
The Last of Summer

Runtime:

Japan:103 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Color:

Black and White | Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Finland:S | UK:A (original rating) | UK:U (re-rating)

Company:

Toho Company

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Ikite wa mita keredo - Ozu Yasujirô den (1983)

Baloney!

It is a bunch of baloney to say that END OF SUMMER is far behind Ozu's other efforts. I have seen most if not all of Ozu's most acclaimed works, and END OF SUMMER is the best one I've ever seen. It even surpasses TOKYO STORY, which many scholars claim is Ozu's best masterpiece, one of the greatest movies of all time. For my money, END OF SUMMER is one of the top five foreign movies of all time. The beautiful photography is sublime; the movie contains some of the funniest things in any Ozu movie; and the ending is one of the most heartbreaking, most superbly visualized endings ever put on celluloid! I just can't say enough good things about this movie. There may be another Ozu movie I haven't seen that surpasses this one, but I sincerely doubt there's more than one, if there's even one.