Popular reviews

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  Review by Melissa Tamminga ★★★★ 4

  “Can your dads take out their teeth like my dad?”

  Jostlings for superiority, shufflings for power, and contests of strength – flurries of action that settle into hierarchies – these games are played out in the neighborhood spaces where boys vie for sparrows’ eggs and in the workspace where men vie for the biggest laugh from the boss. Who eventually becomes general, who becomes lieutenant general, and who becomes the one slain by an invisible bullet firing forth from the finger of another is as arbitrary and ridiculous as it is terribly serious.

  The revelation that a father’s position relies on such arbitrary and demeaning ridiculousness disrupts two boys’ own sense of position and self. Indignant and grand, the boys…

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  Review by Ziglet_mir ★★★★★ 10

  Viewed with the Amazing Edith’s Collab Film Group. I’m mixing it up this week and not giving an actual review, but a Zig original. This film hit deep, and I still don’t think I did it justice.

  
  I Was Born But…

  something in the distance roars,
  uncontrollably,
  overwhelmingly,
  ferociously,
  in a radioactive glow of anticipation—
  Just something of tomorrow,
  appearing before the horizon.
  Adulthood or war?

  Will they live the same sorry lives we have?

  The struggle of those here prior,
  always serving, often overlooked,
  (walking the well-traveled road)
  are the heroes of the daily.
  We are Another.
  Dust in the air just to settle again (and again and again).

  Will we be better men than our fathers?

  The billowing smoke…

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  Review by Joshua Dysart ★★★★★ 13

  Which is boldest in your memory? Remembering the first time you realized your father was a buffoon? Or the first time you realized the world was divided into stratified economic caste classes that would, to a lesser or greater degree, hold sway over the rest of your life?

  Or was it when it dawned on you that the two might be deeply related to one another?

  Ozu’s soft power is always his ability to delicately pick apart society. Not just his society. Not society as a cultural construct. But all society. Society as a human construct. He often wields this power while being extremely funny, and this time, overwhelmingly, authentically adorable.

  The two brothers are off-the-charts. No sap here, just…

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  Review by Sally Jane Black

  This is a reserved, quiet explication of the anarchic ideas of Zero for Conduct with a core of sorrow. It's astonishing how elegantly this film depicts coming-of-age disillusionment, acknowledges the futility of (being born?) a life in such a world, and still retain a certain feeling of child-like joy in the wide open world. There's more than one shot where both brothers do the same thing, one brother slightly behind the other, walking along in unison, and every time it happened, I just felt my brain bleed in some sort of twisted delight at the visual, even when it was a sad one.

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  Review by Remobo ★★★★ 7

  See Keiji
  See Ryoichi
  They have just moved to a new town.
  They have to go to a new school to learn.
  Learn, learn, learn.

  See Kennosuke
  He watches his boys very closely to make sure that they grow up smart and strong.
  Watch, watch, watch.
  He works very hard to give them the things he never had, and hopes that they won't ever have to work as hard as he has.
  Work, work, work.

  See the boys at school.
  They don't like school.
  It is hard work.
  Work, work, work.
  They must learn calligraphy.
  They must learn math.
  They must learn the hierarchies of social existence.
  Learn, learn, learn.

  See the boys.
  See father.
  They were having a fun…

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  Review by san ★★★½

  Ozu: a master at directing parents, children, and family values. Even in his early career, there is a strong theme on generational conflict present. I found it to be a realistic reflection on what parents tend to expect from their kids and vice versa.

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  Review by Paul Elliott ★★★★

  With strong comedic performances by everyone involved, especially Tomio Aoki and Hideo Sugawara, I Was Born, But... illustrates that it's legendary director Yasujiro Ozu had a firm aptitude for combining elements of light entertainment with his trademark social commentary. He makes delightful use of a great script from screenwriter Akira Fushimi, which although commences as an unruly satire unexpectedly changes gears to incorporate a darker mood. This movie is another beautiful example of Ozu’s proficiencies and temperaments as a filmmaker and discerns him formulating moments of deadpan comedy to slapstick hilarity.

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  Review by BrandonHabes ★★★★½ 2

  I was born, but then I grew up and learned that hero worship is a bitch of a thing. I was born, but then I grew up and discovered that real power is not acquired by what I learned on the playground and schoolyards. Power and hero worship are the twin pillars of Ozu's domestic, coming-of-age, cross-examining tale between old and young generations. Keiji and Ryoichi, two young brothers bullied by a gang of neighborhood kids, have a very specific image of how power is gained. 

  If the bullies beat them up, they must find an even bigger bully to beat them up. Power is brute force. Power is outfighting your enemies. Even mythically, power for these boys means eating raw…

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  Review by Geoffrey Broomer 10

  It might not always come across on here, but I'm a classic film loving Japanophile.

  ...I just spend all my time watching DTV 90s action, because those films feature a large void of discourse. Not that my reviews are insightful, but if I can shed some light on a Daniel Bernhardt explosion that might not be otherwise accounted for - I prefer using my time for that, than covering a celebrated classic or big budget blockbuster that dozens of books, hundreds of blogs and thousand other members have already mined out.

  "LOCAL BOY WATCHES SEQUEL TO MANK: A5V7 how is this torrent a cam copy when we don't even have theatres?!"

  That is my PM Entertainment snobbery. It's not an…

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  Review by Keaton B ★★★★★ 2

  This masterpiece is rightly billed as one of Ozu's greatest comedies. The film centers around a pair of kids who slowly come to the realization that their father is more or less a salaryman, whose position in society is much more inflexible that what they had imagined. It's much funnier than it sounds, though. The opening scenes where the kids deal with local bullies is certainly a highlight. The way they deal with their parents is no less amusing. In many ways, they are the masters of the house. This film was so popular that Ozu even made a sequel of sorts in 1959, Good Morning.

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  Review by Ethan Lyon ★★★★ 10

  7th Yasijurō Ozu (after Late Spring, An Autumn Afternoon, Equinox Flower, Good Morning, Tokyo Story and Early Summer, before Tokyo Twilight, Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family, I Graduated But..., Floating Weeds and Late Autumn)

  Coming-of-age films never really connect with me, mainly because I never really was a kid. I didn't do the kid things of going around in gangs or riding bikes like you see in the movies. I sat in my room and read books or played Gran Turismo 4. I didn't grow up- I was just born Old. Read into that what you will, but I always feel closer to adults in any film, and I Was Born is no exception. Rewatching it after a…

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  Review by 🐱Andrew Chrzanowski🐱 ★★★★½ 4

  ☆"You think Dad's an important man?"
  "I guess so…"☆

  After two satisfying trios of films from renowned Japanese directors of very different eras and styles -- the wild Yakuza absurdity of Seijun Suzuki and the satirical adult comedy of Juzo Itami -- it's time to finally rectify one of the most glaring omissions in my film list. That is, the one of Yasujirō Ozu, of whom I've seen zero pictures. I've got a good group queued up, from TV recordings and purchases, so let's try to go through them more or less in chronological order. We'll start with one of his most acclaimed silent films, I Was Born, But…

  Ben Mankiewicz introduced I Was Born, But… on TCM -- the…