Hisao Yoshitani
The film generally regarded as Japan’s first true musical was also the first film made entirely in-house by the pioneering studio P.C.L., a company founded specifically to take advantage of emergent sound technology. P.C.L. worked in collaboration with a brewer’s firm, Dai Nihon Biru, who met the production costs of the film in full, and whose products are featured in the film in an example of the sophisticated and modern merchandising typical of the studio’s early work. The film is partially set in a beer hall, and its story concerns a beer seller at a train station and her relationship with a music student trying to create a hit song. Director Sotoji Kimura was to become a company stalwart, making such films as Ino and Mon, while actress Sachiko Chiba would emerge the studio’s first real star, appearing in such films as Wife Be Like a Rose.
A playwright moves to a rural neighborhood to avoid the distractions of the city, but he discovers there are plenty of ways to get sidetracked in his new home, too.
Kenji is a small thief who likes drinking and fighting. When he falls in love with sweet and simple Yazue, and she finds out what kind of guy he really is, she leaves him 'until he becomes an honest person'. But it is not easy to get rid of one's past...
The remaining fragments of an early Ozu film. It is the simple story of two friends who live together in a poor tenement and who share about everything in life (food, hopes, work...). Everything goes well until they gallantly rescue a young (and pretty) woman injured in a road accident. Since the lady has nowhere to go, the two good-hearted friends invite her to their home. She soon becomes their housemaid and they soon begin to seek her favors. Alas, she falls for a young student she has met in the neighborhood, much to the two friends' dismay.
