Tokyo-Ga (1985)

Directed by: Wim Wenders | 88 minutes | documentary | Starring: Chishu Ryu, Werner Herzog, Yuharu Atsuta, Chris Marker

Yasujiro Ozu is the motivator behind this documentary by German filmmaker Wim Wenders. At the beginning of the film, Wenders states that he is fascinated by the work of his Japanese colleague, who died in 1962, and wants to look for something left over from his work in Japan. Either the environment or the people. In a place as changing as Tokyo, Wenders expects to have little left that reminds of Ozu.

What follows, however, is more of a document from Tokyo in the 1980s than a pilgrimage to where Ozu made his classics. The film has some particularly interesting and beautifully filmed scenes, yet as a viewer you cannot escape the idea that the whole thing hangs together a bit like loose sand. An example of this is the short interview that Wenders has with the also German director Werner Herzog, on top of the Tokyo Tower. The subject of this brief – accidental – interview, Herzog was on his way to Australia and his plane made a stopover in Tokyo, actually making a difference to the rest of the documentary. Herzog talks about how he would love to go to Saturn, for example, to shoot pure images there, because you have to go very far on Earth. Interesting to know, but it actually adds nothing to the purpose of the documentary.

Still, Wenders is too talented a filmmaker to make ‘Tokyo-Ga’ a failure. The common thread in the film is sometimes lost, but the choice of subject certainly deserves praise. ‘Tokyo-Ga’ is more of an era of the metropolis than an in-depth study of the world in which Ozu filmed and the relationships between people that the Japanese director so eloquently portrayed in his many films. The images of the metropolis are impressive and stunning. Just the length of the train hurtling through the image…

Very funny is Wenders’ visit to a wax factory, where dishes are prepared from wax, which are then displayed in the various windows of restaurants. They are true artists at work here and Wenders regretfully sighs that he was not allowed to film during the lunch break in the factory. Too bad, he would have liked to show how little the washing food differed from the real food. Also in another part of the film, your mouth falls open when Wenders visits a golf stadium. Japanese people hit a golf ball on three floors… in a field we see thousands of golf balls. You wonder what the sport is because as soon as the ball reaches the field, you have already lost sight of it and you have no idea whether your technique has improved or not. Wenders also shows one of the many pachinko halls, where the Japanese can forget their worries for a while by playing on the pachinko machines (combination of pinball and fruit machines). What argues in favor of the film is the fact that the camera continues to film longer, where amateur filmmakers or tourists would probably have already gone on strike. This provides deepening.

The interviews with Ozu’s regular actor Chishu Ryu and his regular cameraman Yuharu Atsuta are fun to watch, especially for Ozu fans. Both gentlemen speak sincerely and reverently about the director. ‘Tokyo-Ga’ is worth it for these intimate conversations alone.