Girish Kasaravalli on Yasujiro Ozu's "An Autumn Afternoon"

by Chris MaGee

Many of you know that the Criterion Collection will be releasing legendary director Yasujiro Ozu's final film "An Autumn Afternoon" on DVD on September 30th, so when I was surfing through YouTube looking for trailers for our weekly updates I came across a video that I thought was timely. It's a short three minute interview with Indian director Girish Kasaravalli discussing his love for the films of Ozu and specifically "An Autumn Afternoon".

Girish Kasaravalli, whose films include 2006's "Naayi Neralu" and 1977's "Ghatashraddha (The Ritual)", is one of the most renowned contemporary Indian filmmakers and has been awarded the prestigious Golden Lotus Award, the national film award of India, four times for his contributions to cinema.

In the interview he discusses how he feels that Ozu's depiction of the microcosm of the family structure opens up and encompasses larger socio-political issues and the "transparency" of Ozu's characters and how it makes them universal.

I always find it ironic that a director that was thought to be "too Japanese" for foreign audiences to understand has become so universally loved by filmmakers and film fans alike. For more interviews like this one with Girish Kasaravalli check out Criterion's release of Ozu's best known film, 1953's "Tokyo Story" that includes a 40-minute documentary titled "Taking with Ozu" that features such diverse filmmakers as Stanley Kwan, Aki Kaurismaki, Claire Denis, Lindsay Anderson, Paul Schrader, Wim Wenders, and Hou Hsiao-Hsien discussing the masters work.