LATE SPRING (1949)

"...marriage is life's graveyard."

When LATE SPRING begins, the 27 year-old Noriko (Setsuko Hara) is living at home with her widowed father Shukichi Somiya (Chishu Ryu).  She is very happy.  She's constantly smiling and laughing.  She couldn't possibly be any happier than she already is.  Her father is happy also.  The housekeeper is happy.  Hell, even the camera is happy!  For a Ozu film the camera moves around a lot and the editing is quicker than usual.  LATE SPRING starts off as one of the liveliest Ozu films I've ever seen.  It's a joy.  Then...the pressures of "tradition" start to show their ugly head and talk of Noriko getting married starts.  Because of this you might mistakenly think LATE SPRING would be fun like EARLY SUMMER, but you would be wrong.  If anything thing, EARLY SUMMER is the "happy" version of this story and LATE SPRING is the "unhappy" version.

When the marriage talk starts, Noriko simply laughs it off like she does in EARLY SUMMER (Setsuko's character was also named Noriko in EARLY SUMMER), but this time around the family is more adamant and once the pressure begins to build...the joy leaves out of Noriko, out of her father and even out of the camera.  Where there was once movement, smiles and laughter there is now only long static shots, sadness and defeat.

EARLY SUMMER is one of my favorite movies of all time and I watch it a few times a year, but LATE SPRING on the other hand, (while it is expertly made and a beautiful film to look at) is just too damn depressing to watch often.  I feel so sorry for Noriko and her father.  You can tell that they are both heartbroken at the end.  It's just too sad.  Not sad in a UMBERTO D. way, but more like in a THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN way: seeing her, at the beginning of the film, totally happy and content and then being forced to throw it all away simply to satisfy social expectations, but even worse because this was an arranged marriage!

I guess all of this just goes to show how talented everybody involved with this movie was.  Highly recommended.

THE BURGLAR (1957)

It's never a good sign when a film sits unreleased for years until one of the actors becomes famous.  But that's exactly what happened with THE BURGLAR.  It was made in 1955 and then sat unreleased until 1957 after Jayne Mansfield found mainstream success with THE GIRL CAN'T HELP IT.  And it's kinda easy to see why it sat for two years:

First off, those promises in the posters are total bullshit.  "You'll be tense with suspense and limp from excitement!"  It's more like I was limp from not giving a fuck.  "They set up a luscious blonde as bait for the robbery of the century!"  What the fuck are you talking about?  Yes, the criminals sent in Jayne Mansfield to case(!) the house.  That's it.  Later on, Dan Duryea went in and stole one necklace worth $150,000.  That's hardly the "robbery of the century".  "An army of police...and the underworld hot on the scent of the beautiful burglar mixed up in the robbery of the decade!"  Well, now you've already reduced it from the robbery of the century to the robbery of the decade.  And...it was only the cops on their trail and not the underworld at all!  Plus, Mansfield was not the burglar.  She stayed at home during the one and only burglary.

As far as the lame story goes...A burglar (Dan Duryea) successfully steals a "priceless" necklace (which is immediately valued at $150,000), but due to all kinds of amateur mistakes made on his part, he soon finds that the necklace is more trouble than it's worth.  His biggest mistake is not pulling the robbery alone or maybe with just one person to case the the joint.  Instead, he uses his step-sister (Mansfield), who's secretly in love with him(!!!), to go in and scout the location.  Alright, that's fine.  But then later that same night he parks directly out front of the mansion and then he and his two(!!) partners go onto the property while he does 100% of the work!  The other two don't do shit.  Being that it's an very upscale neighborhood, the police start investigating the car and from there on it the whole plan goes to hell.  He does manage to steal the necklace, but since doesn't even have a buyer lined up, he decides it's best if they all four simply hang out in their rented house until...I'm not sure what.  This ends up being a horrible plan (duh!) due to the fact that 1) they're still in the area of the robbery and 2) all three of his partners instantly start to go stir crazy!  Including his step-sister who still wants some of Dan Duryea's delicious ding-dong!

THE BURGLAR is not a bad film, just one that should have never been made.  Uninspired script, lame overacting by the entire cast, uneven photography that's boring most of the time and then kinda cool for brief moments, slow as molasses pace, unlikable characters, dumb decisions nonstop.  On the other hand, Jayne Mansfield is very attractive and probably turns in the best performance of the entire movie.  I normally like Dan Duryea, but goddamn his character was dumb.

I would say "Skip it.", but it was good for a laugh.