Tokyo Story

Tokyo Monogatari

Ozu’s enormously affecting masterpiece, about an elderly country couple visiting their grown-up children in postwar Tokyo.

  • Director

    Yasujirô Ozu

  • With

    Chishû Ryû, Chieko Higashiyama, Setsuko Hara

  • Japan 1953. 136min

  • Digital

  • Certificate

    U

  • English subtitles

Ozu’s gently melancholy but hugely moving masterpiece has an elderly country couple visit their grown-up children in postwar Tokyo; their offspring are focused on work and their own families, and only a widowed daughter-in-law comprehends their plight. The film offers a sublimely serene contemplation of changing values in a changing world, profoundly alert to the disappointments almost inevitable in life.

Also available on BFI Player