FREE ON CINEGEEK.DE Yasujiro Ozu - Tokyo Twilight 

 The hat on the wall hook, the whiskey bottle, the steam from Ozu's teapot - all of these symbolise loneliness in Ozu's cinema. Abandonment, transience. And if you look carefully at Tokyo Twilight, the story of a father (Chishū Ryū) and his two grown-up daughters Takako (Setsuko Hara) and Akiko (Ineko Arima) and their long-lost mother, you will realise how courageously such themes as suicide, alcoholism, abortion and abuse resonate here. Ozu's latest black and white film treads dark territory. Who knows, maybe that's why Tokyo Twilight never appears in Ozu's retrospectives? Ozu remains true to his style. His low shots at eye level and the absence of panning shots. He also remains true to his theme, the family. But everything here is much darker. Anyone who reads contemporary reviews will learn of Ozu's greatest failure. Tokyo Twilight is set in winter, whereas Ozu normally favours the other seasons. The film plunges into the shabby milieu of Tokyo. Then Tokyo Twilight crosses a line: one of the two adult daughters becomes pregnant - out of wedlock. Why did she go astray, asks the other sister? We learn that her mother left her when she was young. That's why she became so "wild". The film itself never judges. It always remains reserved, never savours the daughters' grief, but observes calmly. It is empathetic and accepts its characters.