Synopsis
Snobbish uptown lady Taeko is bored with her countrybred,
taciturn husband Mokichi. She makes up lame lies
to steal away with her friends to a hot spring
resort, where she publicly dismisses him as "Mr
Insensitive". Their marital discord comes
to a head when Taeko discovers that Mokichi was
complicit in her niece's walk-out from her arranged
date. She runs off after having a fit over Mokichi's
uncouth eating habits, unaware that he will be
posted overseas. But over a bowl of ochazuke,
she comes to appreciate his down-to-earth philosophy.
Thoughts from Ozu The script was written during the war. As
the company thought it was such a waste to let
a once-censored script sit and gather dust, I
fished it out of the drawer. In the original screenplay,
the protagonist was called up to the front. Since
times had changed, that was amended to a job transfer
to South America. Admittedly, this weakened the
dramatic development. Nevertheless, what mattered
was the woman's perspective regarding men. Rather
than dwelling on his appearance, or whether he
has refined taste and interests, I wanted to emphasize
that as a man, he has his good points. Regrettably,
this film was not a success.
Background
The
45th film shot from June to September 1952. Initially,
the Ozu/Noda team worked out an entirely different,
serious subject matter for the film following
Early Summer, the story of an old mother
and her five children, set in the countryside.
Since this was quite dark and serious, the course
was changed. After his return from the Chinese
battlefront in 1940, Ozu had teamed up with Ikeda
Tadao for a screenplay called The Flavor of
Green Tea Over Rice, which did not pass the
censorship. Now, 12 years later, this scenario
was revived. However, the extreme political differences
between 1940 and 1952 made many changes necessary.
The precondition for eating ochazuke (green
tea over rice) had been the husband's call to
arms, which was changed to his business trip abroad.
By introducing the young office worker Okada Noboru,
a kind of modernization was brought in. In the
details, the effort to add contemporary manners
can be observed. However, there are no substantial
changes concerning the plot. In particular, since
living space did not change in The Flavor of
Green Tea Over Rice, the essential development
of the original remained intact. The couple in
this film, again, lives in a mansion in Kojimachi,
that is, in an "uptown house". It seems
almost impossible that a country-born office worker,
even if an extremely brilliant one could aspire
to live there in the first generation, if it were
not for his wife's father, probably a leading
businessman. Probably the biggest miscalculation
at the time of the remodeling of a 12-year-old
scenario was to cast the same actor, Saburi Shin,
in the role of the husband, raising the age of
the couple (Saburi was born in 1909). The role
of the wife was to be played by Kuwano Michiko
(1915-1946). The contrast between the wife with
an "uptown" lifestyle and the husband
with a provincial lifestyle, the wife's selfishness,
and the husband's sense of incongruity would have
been more natural because of their youth. In 1953,
their more advanced age deprives the film of its
lightness and freshness. The adaptation to contemporary
times goes against the spirit of the original
work. The soul of the wartime scenario was its
opposition to the trend of the times, to the point
of not passing the censorship. The significance
of The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice lies
in Ozu's homecoming to a Tokyo setting.
Personal
Thoughts and Comments
"I didn't tell you a lie. I just...didn't
tell you." With Flavor of Green Tea
Over Rice, Ozu uses his traditional simplistic
filmmaking methods with a blend of some complex
camera work including detailed tracking shots
(usually in transitions of scenes). Overall the
film is absolutely breathtaking on a visual level
and different from the standard Ozu style. Of
course Ozu is a mastery of subtle aesthetics,
and even though he implores some variety of techniques
or camera movement, Flavor of Green Tea Over
Rice is at its most emotionally powerful and
poetic when the camera is static (such as in the
unforgettable sequence that finds Taeko on the
train alone reflecting or escaping the imagined
happiness of her marriage). The emotional connection
is also evident as here Ozu presents the relationship
of a middle-aged husband and wife who are losing
interest in their arranged marriage. Like his
1937 comedy What Did the Lady Forget?,
this often recalls the tone of Ernst Lubitsch
influence in its playfulness. The film is certainly
among Ozu's most light-hearted films and still
contains much of the subtle sad melodrama he was
accustomed for. The Flavor of Green Tea Over
Rice is a touching and hopeful film of the
strength and revival of love. Ozu expresses sympathy
for the husband but does not judge or condescend
the husband or the wife, rather detailing the
relationship of an arranged married couple with
conflicting interests and lifestyles. The opening
scenes set the playful tone, as both the husband
and wife are seen by lying, or perhaps they are
just hiding their true feelings from each other
and from themselves. The wife seems to get a revelation
of her own selfish and understands that what she
thinks she despise about her husband could actually
be what she loves. In the end there is hope and
Ozu closes the film with a playful tracking shot
that embodies the Lubitsch-touch tone of the film.
With Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice Ozu
slightly alters his traditional postwar style
while keeping the lasting emotional depth and
themes, and ultimately the result remains as universal
as his greatest masterworks.