Director: Yasujiro Ozu
I was deciding back and forth between 4 and 4½ stars for this film, when I decided that it's my rating system and I don't really care if I have to throw a ¼ in there.
Floating Weeds opens with two shots that are almost tableau-like - we're not 100% sure we're watching an Ozu film after them, but we can be pretty sure we're watching the film of a very confident, precise filmmaker. The film concerns a traveling band of Kabuki actors, the leader of whom has secretly fathered a son in the town he's visiting. Stuff ensues.
One of my favorite Ozu touches is the constant need for establishing shots. Unlike most establishing shots, which point the camera directly at the building/place our scene is going to take place in, the camera will sometimes be pointed near where the scene is going to take place, or from where the scene will take place, looking out. It's almost like a reset button for the movie; it prepares us for the scene that's about to take place.
I've only seen two Ozu films, but a drawback of both these films is that their plot structure is flimsy and loose. Tension builds inconsistently - it's there, but it's often well in the background, and it comes to the fore in unexpected ways. This can sometimes make what seem like boring scenes engrossing, and vice versa.
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