Kobayashi Masaki, the gritty master behind "Ningen no joken" (The Human Condition, 1959-1962) and "Seppuku" (Harakiri, 1962) started his career as an assistant director and screenwriter to several films by Kinoshita Keisuke. Serving his internship under such a figure left a clear mark to Kobayashi, whose first own directorial efforts closely resembled the films that Kinoshita had turned out during the late 1940's and early 50's. Mind you, the classic period of Kinoshita's career was yet to come.
Kinoshita made the kind of films that Shochiku liked to release: contemporary blends of drama and comedy, with modern sentiments, without over-politicizing everything (though there were exceptions). Kobayashi, a man haunted by his experience of WWII, was not the right guy to make films like this, but had initially problems of getting his darker narratives off the ground, with the studio being as it was.
"Musuko no seishun" (Youth of the Son, 1952) is Kobayashi's debut. Only 45 minutes in length - he would come to be known for extremely long films - you would never guess who made it. The film is a warm depiction of a post-war Japanese family with two sons approaching adulthood and enjoying their youth. "Youth" in this film's view is a simplistic concept, which mostly includes dating girls and fighting with other boys, and thus getting into trouble.
Though the film is very short indeed, the tone varies, but it's for the most part an enjoyable experience. The strangest aspect, considering again who Kobayashi would come to be as a filmmaker, is that this film includes a bunch of singing. Besides hearing "Happy Birthday to You" in English, the young people of this film are singing the theme song to John Ford's 1949 film "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" in Japanese. This was a bit surreal, but certainly a memorable curiosity.
The cinematography is better than in an average Shochiku debut of that era, some would argue that it's better than that of an average Shochiku film, even though the cinematographer Takamura Kuratoro was only at the beginning of his career. Acting feels slightly loose, because the narrative is not grounded, but the actors are very pleasant. Ishihama Akira would go on to play an important role in "Harakiri", and of the studio regulars, Miyake Kuniko, Kita Ryuji and Ryu Chishu contribute also to the charm of the whole.
All in all, Kobayashi's filmography being much smaller in quantity than that of his contemporaries, with only 21 feature films, I understand that many of his fans will want to check this out. It's not up to his later standards, but it's also not his worst film, as his early filmography contains a few missteps like "Mittsu no ai" (Three Loves, 1954). "Youth of the Son" is interesting, because it's the debut of a famous director, though I would suspect that it would have been forgotten if this hadn't been the case.
