Kazoku

The Japanese title "Kazoku" means "Family", but the story is what unlikely happens for ordinary families. A family of husband, wife, a boy, a baby girl and husband's father moves from a small island of Kyushu, where the husband worked for a small subcontractor of a coal mining company, to a livestock farm in eastern end of Hokkaido. Furthermore, they are Catholic, less than 1% of Japanese population.

The writer and director Yamada Yoji was 38 when he started to take the film. I don't know which he first determined, the title or the story. Perhaps he first wanted to portray something about families, then came up the story.

The husband has a dream to work without being ordered nor managed, but he lacks reality thinking. He is brave toward future issues, but is short-sighted and lacks decision toward present issues. The performance of Igawa Hisashi acting as such husband is superb. The wife is reluctant on his idea, but once she makes her mind to go to Hokkaido with him and their children, she acts pro-actively. Baisho Chieko acts the wife with superb performance too. Only flaw is that she is too beautiful. Every time they make an argument, the wife has solid opinion and it ends up the husband, as the head of the family, roars in temper.

On the IMDb web site I found the USA title was "Where Spring Comes Late". This makes sense to imply its happy ending where spring comes in June, after the tragic hard travel. But this title intently avoids original idea to portray tragedy and happiness of a family.

This film was released in 1970, in the era of high economic growth of Japan. You see many things that represent 1970 of Japan: Expo '70 held in Osaka, newly construct big factories, small family cars, crowded underground shopping mall, etc. It looks like present days in China.

This is a great film, written and directed by Yamada Yoji in 1970 --- about the same time as the first Tora-san films were coming out, and with many of the same actors. But unlike the Tora-san films, this is a serious film, not at all frivolous. I'm not sure if there is an English version available (either subtitled or dubbed).

Apart from its dramatic interest, the film is also of historical interest since it depicts the hard-driving 'go-go' era of Japanese economic growth, crowned by the World's Fair Expo in Osaka in 1970. You can see and feel rapid economic change and social dislocation everywhere in the film, and this in fact is the driving force behind the plot: a poor family of miners from Kyushu (the southernmost of the main islands of Japan) uproot themselves and make the long journey to what they hope is a better life in Hokkaido (the northernmost of the main islands of Japan). Their journey is beset with hardship and tragedy.

It's interesting that Yamada returned to this theme of the Kyushu-Hokkaido link, and the mining industry, in the later 1977 film Shiawase no Kiiroi Hankachi (The Yellow Handkerchiefs of Happiness).

You can look at 'Kazoku' as a film of social commentary, but, although Yamada depicts many of the social difficulties of the time, it's not clear what particular message, if any, he wants to impart about these. I don't think he is saying that economic growth and social change are bad, but he shows they plainly create a lot of upheaval and stress, and also a breakdown of fellow-feeling amongst men. As with most of his films, however, it ends on a positive note, where hope and human kindness eventually come to the fore.

So even if Yoji Yamada hadn't made 48/50 Tora-san films (none of which are bad, and quite a few of which are great), he'd still be a highly regarded director based on the strength of his non Tora-san films...

He churns out good movies like there's no tomorrow, and When Spring Comes Late is probably my favourite of his non Tora-san movies I've seen so far.

It's the perfect story for Yamada's skills, as it's authentic, human, and methodically paced, but still consistently engaging, emotional, and with plenty of opportunities to show off the beauty of Japan.

Performances are great, with Chieko Baisho and Chisyu Ryu being the standouts. Loved seeing so many Tora-san actors too, including Kiyoshi Atsumi himself in a small but fun role.

It's heavy going at times but the emotional content feels earned and never forced, and it's incredible how Yamada and the cast make you feel so strongly for these people in such a short amount of time.

Most flashbacks are implemented well, but occasionally they're not, and I think the father character may have been a little unrealistically mean spirited at times, but otherwise flaws are minor. This is a fantastic drama from Yoji Yamada, and I can see myself happily rewatching it at some point, too.

I like Yamada Yoji. Likable is half of his brand. This is a Japanese director, who is most known for his Tora-san films. Tora-san (Otoko wa tsurai yo, in Japanese) is the world's longest film series with the same lead actor, that being Atsumi Kiyoshi. Those films are charming comedies with a hint of sadness and a bunch of nostalgia for home and childhood. Nothing fantastic, but not bad either. Yamada directed an amazing 46 out of 48 entries.

For Yamada, this meant that during several of his most fruitful decades as a film-maker, he did not have time to do much else than Tora-sans. This is a little sad, since he is a talented director, capable of other things as well. And when he took his one and only break from that franchise after the second movie to direct "Kazoku" (Where the Spring Comes Late, 1970), for mysterious reasons, he chose to use exactly the same group of actors, who are the central players of the Tora-san universe.

For western audiences, this is most likely not a problem. However, Kazoku is a serious drama, and Tora-sans are comedies. And Yamada's frustrating way of forcing Tora-cameos to this film really pulls you out of the experience. This is sad, because "Kazoku" (the title is Japanese for "family") could really be the best film of Yamada's career.

This film is about the plight of a poor worker family, who leave their old living quarters in the southern island of Kyushu in hopes of a better life in northern Hokkaido. To get there, they will have to travel for several days, in which time they face several personal tragedies. The ending, however, gives us hope of a spring coming late for them.

The story is both interesting and universal. Even though I criticized Yamada for using "Team Tora" so thoroughly, the female lead Baisho Chieko is fantastic. In the Tora films she plays Tora's little sister Sakura, and though she is the emotional heart of those films, she doesn't really get much to do in them. Here, she gives a soulful and compelling master-class performance. Another notable exception is the great Ryu Chishu, known for the world cinema audiences from his many Ozu roles. Due to his presence as the family's grandfather, I was making many comparisons to Ozu's Tokyo Monogotari (Tokyo Story, 1953), to which this could work as a thematic sibling-film. If it weren't for the comical misteps...

Yamada can't keep the tone of his masterwork coherent for the entire duration. Every now and then there's either comedic elements that don't fit like the cameo by Atsumi himself, or scenes that cry out for a director, with more political views to express. As a depiction of the plight of the poorer classes, it would have been interesting to see, what a nastier director like Shindo Kaneto or Kobayashi Masaki could have done with the scenario. I dare say I would not be talking about Tora-san, if they had been in charge.

The story would have benefited from a few additions to it. In the beginning, the audience should be better informed, as to why the situation of the family has grown so dark, that they have to re-locate themselves to the other side of Japan. Now it seems like that was just an opportunity they took. Then again in the end, when Yamada is trying to fill his audience with optimism, it would have been great to see more concrete things, that could indicate things actually improving for the characters.

Even after this criticism, I think this is one of Yamada's best works, and deserves to be viewed. Even if it's not as good as it could be, it's better than most Tora films are, and really hints that Yamada (as well as Baisho!) could have taken breaks from the franchise more often.