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Two Films by Yasujiro Ozu (The Only Son / There Was a Father) (The Criterion Collection)

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A widowed high school teacher named Horikawa (Chishu Ryu) experiences a There Was a Fathertraumatic episode during a school field trip and consequently, decides to abandon his profession and move to a small town where his son, Ryohei may obtain a good education. However, unable to earn enough money to pay for Ryohei's boarding school, Horikawa decides to return to Tokyo to find a better paying job. The separation between father and son would prove to be permanent and irreversible, as Ryohei completes his studies and becomes a schoolteacher in a rural province while his father continues to work in Tokyo. The film is a more sentimentally subdued - but nevertheless, affecting - quintessential Ozu home drama on parental obligation and the inevitable dissolution of family. At this juncture, Ozu's camera is more static and understated (similar to Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family), such as the repeated extended sequence of father and son fishing in synchrony at a lake: first, when Ryohei was a young boy, then later, as a grown man vacationing with his father at a resort.

The Only Son is a quintessential Ozu home drama on the relationship between a widowed mother (Choko Iida) and her son, Ryosuke. Encouraged by her son's ambitious elementary school teacher (Chishu Ryu), the mother slaves at a silk manufacturing factory, sacrificing personal and financial comfort and security, in order to support Ryosuke's education so that he may grow up to be a "great man". Thirteen years later, she travels to Tokyo to visit Ryosuke and finds that that his once seemingly bright future has become quashed by limited opportunity and personal obligations. Alternately poignant, comical, and bittersweet, the film is a thoughtful exposition of Ozu's familiar themes of familiar estrangement and acceptance of life's inevitable disappointments.

This set contains two films by Yasujiro Ozu, one of the greatest Japanese filmmakers of all time and one of the most prolific.

The first film, The Only Son, is about a woman who makes many sacrifices to make sure her son receives a proper education. The disc also includes new interviews with three film scholars.

The second film, There Was a Father, is about a widowed schoolteacher who discovers that his efforts to educate him are alienating him instead. The disc includes new interviews with two film scholars.

This is a set that has great films but will be more appreciated by fans of Ozu.