Impermanence

From Tokyo Story: 



   Eastern culture emphasizes the impermanence of nature. （Maybe grandpa realizes that his kids are supposed to move on.) The same impermanence happens in a family. Nonetheless, we expect that children will always play their roles as children even when they have their own families. 

      Life is impermanent but humans want to find regularity in this irregular world; that is why we assign roles to different people. But Ozu wants to capture this impermanence in his movie. Maybe parenthood and marriage are also in the realm of impermanence. Maybe everyone is disconnected. Parents in this movie only want to find their projections on their kids.

     The relationship between mother and children seems to change according to age.  

            At the beginning of the movie, we see that the old couple is packing their items for their last trip in their life. But at the end of the movie, we see the same configuration of the house. All their belongings are still in the house but Tomi, the grandma figure, is gone. It seems only the objects stay the same, but human beings are always changing. 

Comments

  1. Krishnan VenkateshNovember 28, 2021 at 9:34 AM

    They are constantly packing and unpacking their bags -- in constant anticipation of motion. Then is there anything we can build longterm emotions on? -- fixed roles and duties, to hold us steady? Vows?

    ReplyDelete

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