Tokyo-Ga

Film · Tokyo Stories: Japan in the Global Imagination

Saturday, November 9, 2:30 PM

Traveling to Tokyo in 1983, Wim Wenders sets out to find remnants of Yasujiro Ozu, whose work he considers a “holy treasure of cinema,” and meets with the Japanese master’s former leading man Chishu Ryu and cameraman Yuharu Atsuta. While there, the German director reflects on the sights and sounds of the sprawling metropolis he had previously only encountered through Ozu’s films, journeying into pachinko parlors, public parks and a plastic model factory with a tourist’s sense of curiosity and fascination. A time capsule of early ’80s Tokyo, captured in gorgeous 16mm Eastmancolor footage by cameraman Ed Lachman, Wenders’ highly personal tribute to Ozu also doubles as a poetic rumination on the evocative power of images.

1985, West Germany/USA, 92 min., DCP, in English, Japanese and German with English subtitles. Directed by Wim Wenders. With Chishu Ryu, Yuharu Atsuta, Werner Herzog.

“My journey to Tokyo was no pilgrimage. I was curious to see if I could discover something from this time, whether something was left of [Ozu’s] work, images perhaps, or people even… Or if in the 20 years since Ozu’s death so much changed in Tokyo that there was nothing left to be found.”

—Wim Wenders

Part of Tokyo Stories: Japan in the Global Imagination

Tickets: $14/$11 seniors, students & persons with disabilities/$10 members

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