A lighthearted take on director Yasujiro Ozu’s perennial theme of the challenges of intergenerational relationships, Good Morning tells the story of two young boys who stop speaking in protest after their parents refuse to buy a television set. Ozu weaves a wealth of subtle gags through a family portrait as rich as those of his dramatic films, mocking the foibles of the adult world through the eyes of his child protagonists. Shot in stunning color and set in a suburb of Tokyo where housewives gossip about the neighbors’ new washing machine and unemployed husbands look for work as door-to-door salesmen, this charming comedy refashions Ozu’s own silent classic I Was Born, But . . . to gently satirize consumerism in postwar Japan.
Direction
Ozu's low-angle tatami shots, now in gorgeous color
Writing
Fart jokes as legitimate dramatic structure
Acting
The kids' deadpan commitment to their strike
Director
Yasujirō Ozu
Keiji Sada
Heiichiro Fukui
Yoshiko Kuga
Setsuko Arita
Chishū Ryū
Keitaro Hayashi
Kuniko Miyake
Tamiko Hayashi
Haruko Sugimura
Kikue Haraguchi
Kōji Shitara
Minoru Hayashi
Masahiko Shimazu
Isamu Hayashi
Kyōko Izumi
Midori Maruyama
Taiji Tonoyama
Pushy Man
Toyo Takahashi
Shige Okubo
Sadako Sawamura
Kayoko Fukui
Eijirō Tōno
Hiroshi Tomizawa
Teruko Nagaoka
Toyoko Tomizawa
Haruo Tanaka
Tatsuzo Haraguchi
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This is Ozu's rare color film and a loose remake of his own 1932 silent 'I Was Born, But...'—he basically covered his own greatest hit.
The farting contest isn't just crude humor; it's the only honest communication in a film about adults who literally cannot say what they mean.
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